Vossloh awarded megacontract for high-speed line in France

The French tracklayers TSO SA and Eurovia Travaux Ferroviaires SA (ETF) have concluded a contract with Vossloh for fully equipped switch systems as well as rail fastening systems destined for France’s South Europe Atlantic High-Speed Line (SEA HSL). The deal is worth around €60 million.

The SEA HSL project is a high-speed line between Tours and Bordeaux along a length of altogether 340 km for speeds of up to 320 km/h. The travel time between Paris and Bordeaux will thus be shortened to two hours and five minutes – about 60 minutes less than now.

Vossloh Switch Systems will deliver the switches between October 2014 and November 2015. Having supplied equipment for a series of high-speed projects over recent years – as in France, Italy, UK, Spain and Korea – Vossloh Switch Systems is worldwide among the foremost companies in this market.

Vossloh Fastening Systems, internationally leading supplier of fasteners for slab tracks on high-speed lines, is with the Tours-Bordeaux contract adding to its prime high-speed references another ballasted track project. Back in the spring of 2012, it had been awarded a contract for supplying rail fasteners on the first North African high-speed line Tangier-Rabat-Casablanca. This line, too, will be ballasted.