28 August 2019 – Global engineering, design, and advisory company Aurecon has been appointed by the Public Transport Authority (PTA) of Western Australia to deliver the detailed design of its upcoming future Railcar Assembly Facility, Bellevue.

This follows Aurecon’s recent work advising on railcar procurement for PTA and having been named as preferred technical advisor for PTA’s METRONET Railcar Procurement Project, supporting METRONET during the next four years.

Aurecon is acting as Lead Consultant for the design of the METRONET Assembly Facility and future depot and stabling facility. The project is reaching completion of the first critical stage of detailed design delivery. Following this, Aurecon will then provide constructability support and as-built production capability.

Aurecon’s Managing Director for Infrastructure Ben Stapleton said our diverse local WA rolling stock team had the proven technical and project support to deliver for PTA.

“Our team is providing a whole of lifecycle approach, utilising its rolling stock expertise and experience and innate future-readiness to successfully deliver the detailed design output in a tight timeframe,” Mr Stapleton said.

The assembly and commissioning facility, which will be built at Bellevue and which is only a few kilometres away from where the original home of railways in Perth stood at the Midland workshops, will support the $1.6 billion Railcar Program.

This program will deliver 102 new railcars (17 six-car sets) needed for METRONET projects and 144 railcars (24 six-car sets) to replace the ageing A-series trains, which were the first electric trains on the Transperth network.  It will also seek to replace the five diesel railcars that operate the twice daily Australind service between Perth and Bunbury.

Delivery of the first 17 METRONET trains, known as the C-series, is due to begin in 2021, with the remaining 24 trains expected to enter service between 2023 and 2028.

Not only will this project allow increased capacity on the rail network to cater for boosted passenger numbers, it will improve service efficiency and reliability, as the older A-series trains are retired.

“We are delighted to be have been named preferred for this procurement work and will partner with PTA to navigate the future of WA’s rail network. This project has been called the “Great WA train revival” and will help to positively change how people live and travel in Perth,” Mr Stapleton said.