Transport for Wales are celebrating after the delivery of the first of 36 Citylink Tram-Trains arrived at the new Taff’s Well Depot. Arriving by road the vehicle – to be designated class 398 – arrived overnight on Tuesday 21st March.
The class 398s are part of the same family of Tram-Train vehicles as the class 399 Citylinks which operate on the Stagecoach Supertram network on South Yorkshire and have also been built by Stadler at their facility in Valencia, Spain. The delivery hasn’t been direct from Spain though as it has been undergoing extensive testing for several months at the Network Rail Innovation and Development Centre in Leicestershire.
Dan Tipper, Transport for Wales’ Chief Infrastructure Officer, said: “The delivery of the first tram-train to our new Taff’s Well depot is a major milestone in the development of the South Wales Metro and the culmination of a significant effort from TfW colleagues and our industry partners over the last few months. We’re on a transformational journey at TfW and these new trains are a key part of improving the customer experience, so that we can encourage more people to travel sustainably on public transport. These are modern trains, with high quality features that will offer our customers more accessible, reliable and greener transport.”
In total 36 of these vehicles are on order and they will form a key part of the South Wales Metro, providing more capacity and more frequent services that will be greener for the environment and more accessible for customers. They are due to enter service next year on the Treherbert, Aberdare, Merthyr and City lines.