News

NEWAG first in Poland to get full TSI approval (including TSI CCS)

Today, NEWAG S.A. rece­ived the first cer­ti­fi­cate of appro­val for ope­ra­tion of  its IMPULS rail vehicle type 31WE-029 and 45WE-014 com­pliant with the Tech­ni­cal Spe­ci­fi­ca­tions for Inte­ro­pe­ra­bi­lity – TSI. The cer­ti­fi­cate was issued by Urząd Trans­portu Kole­jo­wego [the Office of Rail Trans­port] in War­saw.  The cer­ti­fi­cate is valid for an inde­fi­nite period of time.

The Tech­ni­cal Spe­ci­fi­ca­tions for Inte­ro­pe­ra­bi­lity (TSI) are a set of deta­iled tech­ni­cal and func­tio­nal requ­ire­ments as well as pro­ce­du­res for chec­king inte­ro­pe­ra­bi­lity com­pliance publi­shed by the Euro­pean Commission.

They com­prise the fol­lo­wing inte­ro­pe­ra­bi­lity specifications:

• Sub­sys­tem Rol­ling Stock – loco­mo­ti­ves and pas­sen­ger rol­ling stock (TSI LOC&PAS),
• Sub­sys­tem rol­ling stock  – noise (TSI NOI),
• Spe­ci­fi­ca­tions con­cer­ning Euro­pean rail­way acces­si­bi­lity for the disa­bled and per­sons with redu­ced mobi­lity (TSI PRM),
• Spe­ci­fi­ca­tions con­cer­ning safety in rail­way tun­nels (TSI SRT)
• Spe­ci­fi­ca­tions con­cer­ning the sub­sys­tem Con­trol com­mand and Signa­ling (TSI CCS).

The new Regu­la­tion  con­cer­ning the Tech­ni­cal Spe­ci­fi­ca­tions for Inte­ro­pe­ra­bi­lity has been in force since Janu­ary 1, 2015 and its scope com­pri­ses stan­dards per­ta­ining to “the abi­lity of the rail sys­tem to allow the safe and unin­ter­rup­ted move­ment of tra­ins which accom­plish the requ­ired levels of per­for­mance for these lines. This abi­lity depends on all the regu­la­tory, tech­ni­cal and ope­ra­tio­nal con­di­tions which must be met in order to satisfy the essen­tial requirements.

In prac­tice, this means that inte­ro­pe­ra­tive rol­ling stock runs on the inte­ro­pe­ra­tive rail infra­struc­ture and moves between the rail networks of indi­vi­dual sta­teswithout the need to stop at the bor­der, without the need to change the loco­mo­ti­ves at the bor­der, without the need to change the dri­vers at the bor­der, without the need for the dri­ver to per­form any infrastructure-specific activities.

The above-mentioned IMPULS vehic­les will be offi­cially han­ded over to the autho­ri­ties of the Mało­pol­ska Pro­vince under the con­tract for the deli­very of  twe­lve rail vehic­les signed on 30 March this year. The Nowy Sącz com­pany is going to manu­fac­ture cutting-edge elec­tric mul­ti­ple units which will start ope­ra­ting on the Mało­pol­ska rail­way routes as early as at the end of this  year. The offi­cial cere­mony of han­ding over the rol­ling stock will take place on 28 Novem­ber 2016 at the Main Rail­way Sta­tion in Nowy Sącz. The gross value of the rol­ling stock pur­cha­sed amo­unts to nearly PLN 300 million.

Under the con­tract, NEWAG will deli­ver six vehic­les by the end of Novem­ber (four 45WE elec­tric mul­ti­ple units con­si­sting of five sec­tions each and two 31WE EMUs con­si­sting of four sec­tions each) as well as pro­vide com­pre­hen­sive post-purchase service and main­te­nance. The new tra­ins will be able to trans­port pas­sen­gers as early as in Decem­ber this year. The rema­ining  six tra­ins will be deli­ve­red by Febru­ary 15, 2017. The autho­ri­ties of  the Mało­pol­ska Pro­vince can also exer­cise the so-called option rights and pur­chase addi­tio­nal trains.