government,” says Piccardo “The fares are not set high enough.” However, Piccardo remains convinced that passengers will be willing to pay a premium to use Subte if service levels improve. “The passenger was forgotten in the last 10 years,” he says. “There was a tendency towards ‘cheap and bad’, instead of ‘expensive and good’. We believe you can have a reasonable [higher] fare that people are able to pay if you offer service improvements as a trade-off.” He adds the speed of Subte is a huge advantage over buses because “people


the second largest commuter network in the Americas after New York City. However, the 800km system has been suffering from a long period of decline and underinvestment, which was brought into sharp focus on February 22 2012, when an eight-car emu crashed into the buffer stops at Once station, killing 51 passengers and injuring more than 700.


S Since then, the national government


has revoked the license of Buenos Aires Trains (TBA), the private operator which had hitherto operated both the Mitre and Sarmiento lines. The contractor was axed because of its poor maintenance record and performance on these lines.


In May 2012, daily operation was handed over to Ugoms, an entity formed by Subte operator Metrovías and private train operator Ferrovías. Employees from TBA have their salaries paid by the national government, whose transport and interior ministries are now in charge of future planning for the suburban network.


Reflecting concern that poor maintenance of the fleet played a decisive role in the crash on the Sarmiento Line, the state has made fleet renewal and maintenance of the existing trains a priority. In January the government announced it had placed an order with China Southern Rolling Stock (CSR) subsidiary CSR Qingdao Sifang for 25 nine-car emus for the Sarmiento Line along with 30 six-car sets for the Mitre Line. The first vehicles from the $US 506m order are due to arrive in Argentina in February 2014 and deliveries will be completed by November 2015.


IRJ August 2013


UBURBAN rail has an 18% share of the public transport market in Buenos Aires, and the city has


hate losing time in traffic.” One closely-watched test case for


future service improvements will be Line A, which was recently closed for maintenance as its 100-year-old Belgian- made wooden-bodied trains were taken out of service. Over two months, stations were cleaned up and the first 45 new Chinese trains were brought into service. Tendering is currently underway for an additional 105 vehicles for Line A.


The new trains feature air-conditioning which Piccardo describes as one of the ‘soft’ service improvements that will


Reviving the Buenos Aires suburban network


draw passengers back to Subte, along with more frequent trains, cleaner stations, better passenger information, and improvements in passenger facilities, such as Wi-Fi in stations. Piccardo says passengers have


responded positively to the changes on Line A, although it is too early to judge the impact on ridership as the line only reopened in March. “We are convinced that service is the


key,” he concludes. “All of us - the unions, the operators and the state - must work together to improve the service.” IRJ


Little-changed in decades, La Plata station will soon see the installation of overhead catenary as part of the electrification of the line from Buenos Aires. Photo: Keith Fender


In July 2012 a project was announced to put a 17km section of the Sarmiento Line between Haedo and Caballito underground. The tunnel will eliminate the many level crossings on this section of the line, allowing frequencies to be increased to three- minute intervals. The six new underground stations are expected to open in 2015. Tunnel boring machine Argentina, which was last used to build a tunnel in Madrid, is on site waiting for work to begin. The machine, which cost ƒ40m, is the largest in Latin America, and will excavate and line a 10.4m- diameter tunnel at a rate of 20m per day, operated by 60 technicians. At its peak the project is expected to create 2000 jobs directly. Local media reports suggest work on the tunnel will not begin until later this year as final agreements around financing need to be put in place between the national government and a consortium of Iecsa, Odebrecht,


Comsa and Ghella, which is implementing the project.


Modernisation is also planned on the 25kV ac General Roca network. The Argentine government announced recently that it has placed a $US 327m order with CSR for 300 new emu cars, which will be delivered between June and December 2014 (IRJ July p10). Last month the Argentine government announced that electrification and re-signalling work will begin next year on the 60km direct commuter line from Buenos Aires Plaza Constitución to La Plata via Quilmes.


Detailed planning work for the


project is now underway, funded by the transport ministry, and the total budget will be around $US 350m, which includes the cost of new trains. The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) is expected to provide loans worth $US 300m, with the remaining funds coming from the Argentine government.


41


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52