The SAFRA company has just won an important contract for railway renovation from the SNCF, in partnership with the Occitania Region. The contract, which will start in January 2021, concerns 19 firm trains and 10 optional trains, for a total duration of 26 months. The equipment will be renovated on site in Albi, and transported directly by rail thanks to the company’s railway branch line. SAFRA thus adds a new string to its bow with this new rail equipment renovation project.
The contract for the renovation of the Occitanie Region’s trains was launched by the SNCF in January 2020, and won by SAFRA in September of the same year. This contract concerns 12 trainsets in the Midi-Pyrénées area (3 bodies) and 7 trainsets in the Languedoc-Roussillon area (4 bodies) for the firm tranche, and 10 trainsets for the optional tranche, which will be decided 3 months before the end of the contract. The services planned for these TERs will be carried out in two main stages. The first stage will concern only one prototype, the No. 1 trainset, on which the complete inventory of the general work to be done will be determined. The completion time for the prototype train is set at 42 days, compared to 21 days for the following trains. The services to be carried out on the interior include: renovation of seats, floor coverings, cleaning of other interior coverings, removal of waste garbage cans, installation of a complete passenger counting system, replacement of all halogen lighting with LEDs, and renovation of ceilings. For the exterior part, the complete livery was redone, with painting and adhesives. A complete makeover for a second life.
For SAFRA, this contract confirms once again the capacity of our SME to work on new markets. With a solid experience in the renovation of public transport equipment (more than 65 years), and more than 20 years in the renovation of railway equipment (metro, tramway, funiculars), this train renovation project brings a new skill to our company. In terms of logistics, the company has also demonstrated its ability to adapt. In order to work on this equipment, which is much larger than a simple metro, a temporary workshop has been set up, while waiting for the new buildings to be constructed on the Albi site and delivered at the end of 2021. Finally, in terms of jobs, the company will employ around thirty people on the site, as well as subcontractors for the adhesive part.