An order for TGV trains and shunting locomotives is at the heart of a plan to preserve rail-vehicle manufacturing and related industrial activity in Belfort. This was unveiled on 4 October by France’s Secretary of State for Industry Christophe Sirugue and Alstom president Henri Poupart-Lafarge.
The plan has been developed following Alstom’s announcement in September that it intends to cease locomotive production at its Belfort plant by the end of 2018, leaving just a small maintenance business there and transferring assembly work to its factory in Reichshoffen. That announcement caused an angry reaction and prompted negotiations between Alstom and the French government with a view to retaining more work at Belfort.
The result is that the government has asked national operator SNCF to confirm an order for six TGV trains to operate between Paris and Milan, while infrastructure manager SNCF Réseau is to order 20 shunting locomotives for rescue work and other duties.
In addition, the government is to order 15 Euroduplex high-speed trains for the Bordeaux-Marseille cross-country route, which currently has no dedicated high-speed infrastructure.
The government says that this order is being placed “in anticipation of the future completion of the Bordeaux-Toulouse and Perpignan-Montpellier high-speed lines”.
It also expects to confirm “by the end of November” an order for 30 more inter-city trains for long-distance conventional services; these would be produced by Alstom at Reichshoffen.