Spanish railways have faced serious issues due to errors in the technical specifications for ordering narrow-gauge trains from CAF, this is reported by the railway transport news portal Railway Supply.

CAF narrow-gauge trains

An audit conducted by the Ministry of Transport revealed shortcomings in coordination between the infrastructure operator Adif, the train purchaser Renfe, and the manufacturer itself.

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It was found that when drafting the technical specifications for the new trains in 2020, Renfe did not request necessary information from Adif regarding dimensional constraints.

Meanwhile, Adif provided this documentation to CAF even before the contract was signed, but the manufacturer did not inform the purchaser of the received information.

When the dimensional problem arose in January 2021, all three parties failed to take action to resolve it for over two years.

It wasn’t until February 2023 that the information about the incident became public, leading to resignations in the leadership of both Renfe and Adif.

Another year passed before CAF began production of trains designed using the “comparative” method.

Subsequently, the Ministry of Transport tasked the Directorate-General of Railways with coordinating Adif’s interaction with carriers to prevent similar incidents in the future.

Render: MITMA

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