but the orange line is running smoothly and in comparison to my red line experience is probably making it seem even more decrepit than if I didn't have an all-new train comparison to compare it against.All of the Orange Line railcars have not been delivered yet either!!!!! I hope that the MBTA never looks to this crappy co, again for new for new railcars!!!!!!
Yeah OL is doing fine right now. Obviously more cars would be nice but Red is by far the priority.
Before, it was the Orange Line that needed them first because the old Hawkers were breaking down & catching fire. They never were given a midlife rebuild. And so, they just went on & on, & on until the wheels came off, so to speak. Now the rest of the Orange Line's new railcars are on hold because the Red Line's older cars which have been in use since Nixon was prez have begun to show their age & are getting on in years.
Nothing is "on-hold". Red and Orange have each been averaging 1 pair per month of new deliveries for about 6 months now. CRRC is going too slow on deliveries for both lines, but it's only biting Red in the butt because the CRRC's are such a small percentage of the Red fleet while Orange now has 1 more available set of new cars than it had total sets of old cars. And it's quite likely that some of the active CRRC Red cars are down for warranty mods, since they haven't been running 4 sets even though they have 4 sets' worth of accepted cars.Before, it was the Orange Linethat needed thyem first because the old Hawkers were breaking down & catching fire. They never were given a midlife rebuild. And so, they just went on & on, & on until the wheels came off, so to speak. Now the rest of the Orange Line's cars are on hold because the Red Line's older car which have been in used since Nixon was prez have begun to show their age & are getting on in years.
CRRC has been slow in getting the new cars to the MBTA for the longest time. But I guess that no one even knew that this would happen!! I wish & hope that this crappy co is not ever chosen to make any more railcars for the MBTA again. Ever!!!!!
www.boston25news.com
All of their current North American clients have backed away. SEPTA infamously canceled its commuter rail coach order (there's a couple of nearly-complete cars within photography distance sitting in the Springfield plant's yard). And both L.A. Metro and CTA in Chicago passed on very large-quantity option orders of their ongoing orders. The Springfield plant is getting shuttered in 2-1/2 years when the T's order is complete. Nobody here is going to touch them for a generation; they're getting the same multi-decade death penalty that Breda and Nippon Sharyo got after fucking up multiple large/make-or-break orders. And that fate was clinched well before the tariffs got increased. They're totally radioactive.
This is known. They have no incentive to honor the contract. They sold us these trains at a loss to establish themselves in the North American market and the federal government banned them from selling in the market. From CRRC's perspective, it's throwing good money after bad and so they've made the decision to focus on their contracts that bring in money or potential money instead and they, being a national company, have the support of their government. Our legislature actually agreed to waive all of the delay penalties because we could essentially abandon the bid and start a brand new procurement that would take 10 years and arrive after they are needed or we could try and use the carrot to get some of the trains before ours failed.
To be fair, right now Hyundai-Rotem is in the market for a new US facility- they won a 182 car order from LA Metro last year, scheduled for delivery beginning in 2028. In fact, that order is the substitute for the CRRC Springfield option cars. Add in their extensive relationship with the T? Right now, they're the last major global manufacturer without a US plant, ever since Hitachi built their Hagarstown MD Facility, which should be opening this year to fulfill their WMATA/ SEPTA orders.
The new tariffs on China that went into effect this month, I highly doubt the 2025 tariffs was factored in when they reset the contract ages ago. That is the problem.What does Trump have to do with this?!!! The new railcars were ordered long before he returned to office!!!!!!
It wasn't ages ago. It was 9 months ago that they last reset the contract. And that was for a Biden tariff adjustment. This isn't a new thing in the slightest.
There's additional new tarrifs, as well.
Yeah, so? The CRRC contract has been amended a couple times already for new tariffs. This isn't a new "Omigod!" thing. The T has already been paying for tariff increases on this deal since it was signed 12 years ago, and they'll continue to do so because it's cheaper than nuking the contract and soliciting a new one (from a different country that's likely also tariffed and using various source parts from other countries that are likely tariffed) while programming funds for selective systems replacements on the old cars to wheeze them along another half decade (using source parts from other countries that are likely tariffed).
Although, there is a question there - the LA metro and CTA CRRC orders also predate the introduction of anti-China tariffs, both dating to 2016. CTA's order is comparably sized to the MBTA's, (400 vs 404) and was even more aggressively priced than the MBTA's - (632M, 1.58M/car vs our 871M, 2.12M/car) - but my understanding is that neither of them have amended their contracts to adjust for tariffs, and so far CRRC has managed the same approximate 2-3MP/month rate for CTA out of their IL facility as for the T out of Springfield.