Alstom has announced that it has received an order from DB to fit 19 ICE 1 trains with the ETCS system.
The work, worth more than €10 million, is expected to be completed by September 2021.
The project to fit ETCS is a follow-up for the ICE 1, which Alstom had already retrofitted 39 trains for the VDE 8 high-speed line connecting Berlin and Munich.
Since the opening of the high-speed line, passenger numbers have more than doubled.
The contract includes development, design and manufacture of the signalling system ETCS Level 2 Baseline 3, as well as its installation and commissioning.
What did the officials say?
Dr Joerg Nikutta, Alstom Managing Director Germany & Austria, said:
‘We are delighted that Deutsche Bahn has again passed a vote of confidence in Alstom for this complex retrofit. This is a further step towards making Germany fit for digital rail guarantees Deutsche Bahn a uniform and flexibly deployable ICE fleet'
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You are – sort of – in luck. Eurostar operates a number of Siemen Velaro e320 trains which are effectively ICE 3 run by DB and others.
DB have also tested the newer Velaro D and this has been approved for use in the Channel Tunnel. I think they now need to work out the commercials of running different routes.
The ICE trains once went to London St. Pancras International. And I would like to see these iconic trains in London and to operate direct European destinations including Berlin and to Copenhagen, Warsaw, Dusseldorf, Hamburg, Luxembourg, Turin, Monaco and other European cities by rail from London. As Eurostar operates from London to Paris, Lille, Brussels and soon to Amsterdam and Rotterdam.