Lok 2000 / Swiss Locomotives

I had a question regarding Swiss locomotives. It seems the swiss, particularly the SBB, insist on purchasing their equipment through Swiss companies. Most Swiss locmotives seem to be made by SLM . The last series I know about were the RE 460/465 Lok 2000s. SLM has now gone away, I believe some elements survive in Winpro, but I don't believe they produce locomotives or railcars. Stadler, the only manufacturer I know of still in Switzerland, only seems to focus on narrow gauge and smaller units.

So what if SBB or another railroad wants new locmotives? Who is going to step in? Will Switzerland have to learn to live with the Sprinter and associated locos? Will Stadler step up and produce larger locomotives? For that matter, is there any company that produces narrow-guag locos, and would be willing to build a small number for one of the narrow gauge lines?

My guess is that as Switzerland is not a member of the EU they are free to specify buying from Swiss companies. Under EU rules, if they were a member, all orders would have to be advertised for competitive tender.
They would also have split operation between track authority and operating companies. As non-members they don't have to do that either.

cloudship wrote: Will Switzerland have to learn to live with the Sprinter and associated locos? Will Stadler step up and produce larger locomotives? For that matter, is there any company that produces narrow-guag locos, and would be willing to build a small number for one of the narrow gauge lines?

SBB Cargo is already buying Bombardier Traxx and Siemens ES locomotives.
Getting narrow-gauge locos and MUs in small numbers is also no problem. A German-Swiss railroad magazine frequently has articles on some new MU a private swiss RR-company is buying.

All European railways used to buy from their national industries: SNCF from Alsotm, DB from Siemens, FS from AnsaldoBreda...

This reflect in urban transit, too. In Italy there were a lot of Iveco buses, in France Renault, in Germany Mercedes or MAN...

Actually, nearly all new european locomotives are built by Bombardier (Traxx) or Siemens (Eurosprinter, Eurorunner). Alstom is developing its Prima platform, and received an order for 400 diesel locomotives and about 250 electrics from...SNCF, obviously.

Stadler is specialised in special vehicles: rack, engines and EMUs for lines electrified in three-phase AC, in every sort of gauge. Some of these vehicles have even been built in only in one copy.

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Swiss main standard gauge railways (SBB CFF FFS and BLS) are not split completely into different companies, but have been divided into infrastructure and train companies. Private operator are accepted ant even partly financed.

As a matter of fact the Swiss builder Stadler is quite sucessfull in exporting their EMU's and DMU's. Their GTW modular concect E/DMU with a separate intermediade motor compartment allows for adapting to any voltage or to put in a diesel engine.

http://www.stadlerrail.com/

Their reference list is quite impressive.

Gijs

Gotthardbahn wrote:All European railways used to buy from their national industries: SNCF from Alsotm, DB from Siemens, FS from AnsaldoBreda...

This reflect in urban transit, too. In Italy there were a lot of Iveco buses, in France Renault, in Germany Mercedes or MAN...

This time is definitely gone! (Even if one in France will needa little time until one is able to admit this... )

Most important reason: It's against European law.

Another reason: There is today only Bombardier, Siemens, Stadler, Ansaldo/Firema and Alstom - and none of those is today "national" (with the exception of Ansaldo).