San Miguel Corp. said Wednesday said it expects to receive the first batch of trains for the Metro Rail Transit Line 7 project from South Korea next week ahead of the completion of the mass rail project by December 2022.
The delivery, which consists of six cars or two train sets procured from South Korea’s Hyundai ROTEM, cleared inspections and factory acceptance testing, with national rail manufacturer Korea Railroad Corp. serving as SMC’s adviser.
Each train set is 65.45 meters long—or well over the entire length of an Olympic-size swimming pool, which is 50 meters.
“The timely arrival of these brand new, high-quality trains from South Korea—known as one of the world’s best train and rail systems builders—is such a welcome development, and I believe holds a lot of significance,” SMC president Ramon Ang said.
“At a time when many are feeling uncertain about our country’s future because of the pandemic, this shows that the job of nation-building, continues; that the work of improving our infrastructure, boosting our economic growth prospects, and investing in our country’s brighter future, also doesn’t stop–especially for us in San Miguel,” he said.
More trains are expected to arrive in the following months, up to next year, Ang said, until all 108 cars or 36 train sets the company acquired are delivered.
Despite continuing pandemic restrictions and pending right-of-way issues, the project is now at over 54-percent completion, with installation of bored piles, girders and other foundational works on a significant portion of the project already completed.
“Right now, construction activities on the guideway and the stations are ongoing. Electronic and mechanical works also continues. As we said before, the MRT-7 project is in many ways more difficult and complex than even our recently-competed Skyway Stage 3—which in itself is an engineering feat. This is because MRT-7 has added complexities such as electric power systems, computer and communications systems, signaling systems and automatic fare systems, among others,” Ang said.
“There are many causes of delay, from necessary pandemic restrictions, to ROW issues, but as with all SMC projects, we apply 110-percent effort to all the areas we can work on, so as to minimize delays. The most important thing is we don’t stop, we keep on progressing,” Ang said.
SMC reported earlier that manufacturing of other important equipment needed for the MRT-7 which were all sourced from various countries were also completed.
Other railway operations equipment such those needed for automatic fare systems, communication systems, signaling systems, power supply systems, third rail, track works systems and rolling stock maintenance equipment—used for the maintenance of trains—are also set to be delivered from various countries throughout the year.
The first test run of the project is set for December 2022.