Alstom admits Matosinhos paper to manufacture TGV but main in Italy

A Alstom announced today that he is going to the high-speed train competition with the Avelia Stream model, admitting that the Matosinhos factory may play a role in the development of the units, whose main facilities are in Italy.

“ We will use the local knowledge we are developing at the factory in Guifonos [under construction in Matosinhos, Porto district] to play an important role in the manufacture of Avelia Stream in Portugal”, David Torres, director-general of Alstom in Portugal, told journalists in Lisbon today.

However, the person responsible made it clear that “it is an issue that is not yet fully decided and is still part of the process” of the public tender for high-speed trains, for which he is competing with the Spanish woman Talgo.

“The leading factory for the development of this train is and will be Savigliano in northern Italy. It is the same factory that developed the Alfa Pendular for Portugal ", said.

About the model proposed by Alstom, which is not what recently entered service in France (Avelia Horizon, with two floors), has one floor, is able to reach 300 kilometers per hour, allows to have more than 500 seats per unit and a configuration of 2+2 seats in the second class and 2+1 in the first, with a total of 202 meters long and seven carriages.

One of the main characteristics of the vehicle is to have distributed traction, preventing “locomotives at both ends of the train”, said David Torres, which frees up passenger space, considering that this model “is best suited to the requirements of the specifications” of CP.

“The CP service for the Portuguese, in our opinion, must be a ‘premium’ service. People here in Portugal deserve to have comfortable trains that finish [the journey] satisfied, that arrive reliably,” he said.

In view of the absence of a bar in CP’s specifications, David Torres confirmed that Alstom’s proposal will meet the requirements of the competition, which refer to “selling machines”, Lusa consulted.

The manufacturer also admitted that having to adapt the construction to a train with Iberian and non-European gauge “has a cost”, but is “marginal” and “non-relevant”, hoping to meet the 2031 deadline for the delivery of the first train and not having “to be suspicious” of the Ministry of Infrastructure regarding the deadline for the construction of the line between Porto and Lisbon.

Claiming that the train manufacturing market is “at a very positive time”, CP considers that it should renew its fleet around 400 units – in addition to the purchase of about 200 units today – and praised the “step forward” that the country gave in terms of railway investment after “decades of a larger investment in motorways”.

He also said that in addition to the “majority” of Alstom’s contracts to be made for the factory of Guifões and facilities in Maia, in the great Porto, they are also hiring in Lisbon, where is the direction of projects.

“The biggest difficulty is the experience: finding people with sufficient experience or proven experience in the railway sector,” whose lack of investment in recent decades “has had an impact,” said David Torres.

The Alstom factory in Matosinhos, to be built in the context of the purchase of 153 trains by CP, will manufacture 81 motor vehicles for the suburbans of Cascais, Lisbon and Porto, with the remaining 72 manufactured in Barcelona.

CP is also receiving 22 drivers for the regional service commissioned by Stadler.

The Government approved an expenditure of EUR 584 million for CP to purchase up to 20 high-speed trains to move on the country's future lines (Lisbon-Vigo and Lisbon-Madrid).

On October 18, Talgo's executive president said that the company intends to produce Portugal's first high-speed trains with circulation capacity both in Iberian and international gauges.