TTC: Flexity Streetcars Testing & Delivery (Bombardier)

[Incentro]

The 99 car order for Berlin was US$431 million - about US$4.4 million each. More expensive than ours, for deliveries through 2017. Ours was for deliveries through 2019. Your examples are for earlier deliveries.

I'm not seeing huge disparities for Bombardier vehicles. Astronomical prices? Exaggerate much?

Excuse me, I went into the trap of changing exchange rates:
When Bombardier won the TTC Order for 204 LF LRV (3 prototypes and a series of 201 identical vehicles) back in 2009 it was said to be valued at CDN$ 851 million / €523 million - thats about CDN$ 4.2 million / €2.6 million per vehicle.
Link: Bombardier Media Center
The 99 car order for Berlin was valued €300 million but consisted of three different types: 40 ERL (unidirectional, 40 meter long, 7 sections), 35 ZRK (bidirectional, 30 meter long, 5 sections) and 24 ERK (unidirectional, 30 meter long, 5 sections).
It's no surprise that longer or bi-directional vehicles are more expensive than the short unidirectional vehicles.
Although the BVG Berlin carried out a Europe-wide tender, the transport operator focused on the desired model from the very beginning. Developed by Bombardier's predecessor ADtranz, the "Incentro" was no longer offered because it was considered to be too expensive compared with other models in Bombardiers portfolio. For the Berlin tender the "Incentro" was reborn as "Flexity Berlin".

 

[nfitz]

Compare then to the bi-directional Toronto units for Metrolinx ... which are probably a lot more similar to the Berlin units than the specially modified ones for TTC. There's differences, sure. But they are relatively similar.

But remember the Berlin order is for 4 different designs. There are both 30-metre and 40-metre cars, with uni-direction and bi-directional versions of each.

Also keep in mind, that Canadian dollar was at a very unusual peak, well outside it's normal 70-cent to 80-cent range back then. I'm sure Bombardier took that into account.

And also keep in mind the later time-frame for deliveries. If you play the numbers to some extent, you can make the TTC cars more expensive. This means that at worse the TTC cars are somewhat more expensive; I can't see how you can claim they are "astronomical" - and that's my issue.

 

[smallspy]

The most recent streetcar fleet plan I'm aware of requires 45 Flexities and 21% spares for 501/508 for AM peak. So that's 55 Flexities for 501/508. With only 52 ALRVs - that's only going to get 501. And maybe 508. Not enough for both Queen and Bathurst.

I was referring to the plan to put an additional section into the As, which predates the low-floor car purchase by about 10 years. The 52 cars would have handled both Queen and Bathurst and increased the spare ratio, as they figured that they would have been able to take a couple of cars away from Queen on account of the additional capacity provided by the bigger cars.

Now: No, of course they wouldn't be able to provide enough service - but that's also because the TTC hasn't been able to greatly increase the service levels at the peaks on any of the streetcar routes in almost 10 years.

Dan
Toronto, Ont.

 

[nfitz]

I was referring to the plan to put an additional section into the As, which predates the low-floor car purchase by about 10 years. The 52 cars would have handled both Queen and Bathurst and increased the spare ratio, as they figured that they would have been able to take a couple of cars away from Queen on account of the additional capacity provided by the bigger cars.

Now: No, of course they wouldn't be able to provide enough service - but that's also because the TTC hasn't been able to greatly increase the service levels at the peaks on any of the streetcar routes in almost 10 years.

Ah, historically perhaps. I'd assumed this had been a plan to get service to about 2030 or so, when the cars were 40-years old. I hadn't realized we were talking about so long ago - presumably back last century sometime?

 

[nfitz]

Looks like the next car (presumably 4011) arrived in the West Toronto yard very early this morning, only 20 days after 4010 was delivered. I'd assume it gets offloaded at Hillcrest today or tomorrow. No one seems to have sighted it yet.

 

[pstogios]

Looks like the next car (presumably 4011) arrived in the West Toronto yard very early this morning, only 20 days after 4010 was delivered. I'd assume it gets offloaded at Hillcrest today or tomorrow. No one seems to have sighted it yet.

What's your source?

If this is true then let's update the delivery tracker:
4406 (delivered March 18th)
4407 (delivered April 23) - days since last delivery = 35
4408 (delivered June 10) - days since last delivery = 48
4409 (delivered July 23) - days since last delivery = 43
4410 (delivered Aug 26) - days since last delivery = 34
4411 (delivered Sept 15 ??) - days since last delivery = 20

Clearly this would be a significant acceleration in delivery frequency.

 

[nfitz]

4411 (delivered Sept 15 ??) - days since last delivery = 20

Could be 21 if it doesn't get to Hillcrest until tomorrow.

Clearly this would be a significant acceleration in delivery frequency.

It's certainly a good sign. I'd like to see 4412 and 4413 continuing in 3 weeks or less to conclude that (though they should be closer to 7 days by the time 4413 shows if they have any chance of meeting the latest schedule). It's been oscillating between about 35 and 45 all year, so this is the first one to break that pattern. Though I've heard rumours that 4412 and 4413 aren't far behind ... so maybe they've finally ramped up.

 

[nfitz]

Oh ... here's confirmation it's a new streetcar. And a great twitter thread demonstrating TTC Customer Service's ignorance about Toronto. (come to think of it, Brad tweeted yesterday that a new streetcar was on it's way).

 

[nfitz]

Confirmed. 4411 delivered to Hillcrest only 20 days after 4410.

 

[pstogios]

Oh ... here's confirmation it's a new streetcar. And a great twitter thread demonstrating TTC Customer Service's ignorance about Toronto. (come to think of it, Brad tweeted yesterday that a new streetcar was on it's way).

LMAO! That conversation was worth a good laugh. And yeah @TTChelps is pretty ignorant and useless.

I'm excited 4411 is actually here. 20 days it is!

One more question: how did you track the location of flatcar 158091?

 

[the lemur]

LMAO! That conversation was worth a good laugh. And yeah @TTChelps is pretty ignorant and useless.

Looks like they both misunderstood each other, but @JustZennn seems a little obtuse as well.

 

[the lemur]

Compare then to the bi-directional Toronto units for Metrolinx ... which are probably a lot more similar to the Berlin units than the specially modified ones for TTC. There's differences, sure. But they are relatively similar.

But remember the Berlin order is for 4 different designs. There are both 30-metre and 40-metre cars, with uni-direction and bi-directional versions of each.

The situation with procurement of the Flexity Berlin almost seems opposite to the TTC's experience: BVG placed 2 or 3 orders in succession, I believe, sequenced so that the old Tatra streetcars operated in pairs would be replaced with the 40-m cars first. The tram system in Strausberg (30 km east of Berlin) also joined in the order to get a couple of 30-m cars of its own.

 

[nfitz]

What's your source?

If this is true then let's update the delivery tracker:
4406 (delivered March 18th)
4407 (delivered April 23) - days since last delivery = 35

April 23 minus March 18th would be 36 days.

But readling up the thread to April 22nd, I think it was delivered that day, given that morning there was pictures floating around of it having been vandalized in the yard overnight. Also the CPDTD wiki says April 22nd.

Plotting the data does suggest a downward trend:

 

[pstogios]

April 23 minus March 18th would be 36 days.

But readling up the thread to April 22nd, I think it was delivered that day, given that morning there was pictures floating around of it having been vandalized in the yard overnight. Also the CPDTD wiki says April 22nd.

Plotting the data does suggest a downward trend:

View attachment 54921

Throw out 4405 (first one after strike) and 4411 and then do a simple linear regression on that data. There is no downward trend.
4411 is the first delivery with significant improvement. One point does not a trend make. Let's see how 4412 and 4413 stack up before declaring victory over Bombardier's ridiculous tardiness. They are not yet off the hook.

 

[Napoleon]

Throw out 4405 (first one after strike) and 4411 and then do a simple linear regression on that data. There is no downward trend.
4411 is the first delivery with significant improvement. One point does not a trend make. Let's see how 4412 and 4413 stack up before declaring victory over Bombardier's ridiculous tardiness. They are not yet off the hook.

<Scientist Hat> One generally does not throw out data points randomly before attempting to do a least squares fit (the fanciest linear regression one might attempt here). Perhaps a better statistic to use is something like a Pearson correlation but for just one data sample. If I use nfitz's data and look at the direction of change between points it's 5 decreases and one increase, so that suggests a shortening time between deliveries without even doing a fit. </Scientist Hat>

And hey, one more new streetcar, so I'm happier!