Last month, SEPTA officials had announced that the transit agency would be borrowing rail cars from the Maryland Area Rail Commuter (MARC) system to help ease some the issues that have popped up with the ongoing Silverliner IV inspections and maintenance.
Now, a spokesperson with SEPTA told NBC10 that those borrowed MARC cars are expected to make their way to Philadelphia later this week.
In total, SEPTA is leasing 10 train cars from Maryland, at a cost of about $2.6 million and those cars should be in Philadelphia by Friday morning.
After the cars make it to the city, SEPTA will take some time to train crews and mechanics on them, so officials explained that the borrowed trains won’t be on the tracks until mid-December.
The borrowed cars from MARC are classified as coaches so they will feel different to riders, according to SEPTA.
According to SEPTA spokesperson Andrew Busch, the money would come from capitol funds that are part of next year’s budget and the lease has been approved by PennDOT.
Also, Busch said, SEPTA is working to overhaul its fleet of 223 Silverliner IV trains in order to ensure the trains can run for another six to 10 years.
“Repaired Silverliner IV rail cars are performing well, but due to the fact that those rail cars are now over 50 years old, we will have to continue to perform more intensive inspections, maintenance and repairs moving forward. By having more rail cars available, we lessen the possibility of service disruptions due to equipment shortages,” Busch said.
Looking ahead, Busch said that, although SEPTA has no funds budgeted for it at the moment, the mass transit provider is seeking bids from companies to design and build a new fleet of rail cars.
“We are looking at federal loan options that we believe SEPTA will qualify for to cover some of the costs. We typically do not fund major projects with loans due to the added costs, but in this case we have to advance the procurement as soon as possible so we can’t wait for a funding solution,” Busch had told NBC10 in November.
SEPTA’s lease on the MARC cars was set for one year, so the transit agency is expecting to use them through 2026, officials said.
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