The first carbody of the Riyadh Metro being built in Katowice, Poland

Arriyadh Development Authority (ADA) has been notified by Alstom that it has begun production of trainsets to be deployed on the Riyadh Metro.

The trainsets are being built at Alstom’s Katowice plant in Poland and they are part of the contract awarded in 2013 by ADA to the FAST consortium, which includes Alstom and which is responsible for the design and construction of lines 4, 5 and 6 of the metro.

The Katowice plant will manufacture all 69 of the Metropolis trainsets.

The first three trainsets will be delivered to ADA in 2017. The Katowice plant, which hosts around 1,000 employees, is one of Alstom’s largest train manufacturing sites in the world. Every step of the train’s production, including the final static and dynamic tests, is carried out there.

A full-size mock-up of the Riyadh Metropolis trainset manufactured by Alstom will soon be unveiled to the city’s inhabitants by ADA. 

The Metropolis for Riyadh is composed of two cars per set and is 36 m long. Each train features three classes: first class, family and single. The train is driverless and is 100 per cent motorised, allowing it to run on the slopes of the line with gradients up to 6 per cent.

The trains will offer passengers a high level of comfort, ergonomic seating, LED lightning, air conditioning and an advanced passenger information system. In addition to the Metropolis trainsets, Alstom will provide Urbalis, its CBTC signalling solution, as well as the power supply and Alstom’s energy recovery system HESOP. All sub systems have been optimised together so as to reduce energy consumption.

The other Alstom sites involved in the project are located in France (Valenciennes for the engineering, Le Creusot for the bogies, Villeurbanne for the train control and monitoring system, Ornans for the motors and Saint-Ouen for the signalling), Spain (Madrid for the passenger information and security system) and Belgium (Charleroi for the traction sub-system and auxiliary converter).

Headquartered in France, Alstom is a world leader in integrated railway systems and manages the widest range of solutions in the market – from high-speed trains to metros and tramways as well as associated maintenance, modernisation, infrastructure and signalling solutions. The company recorded sales of €6.2 billion ($6.59 billion) and booked €10 billion of orders in the 2014/15 fiscal year.