Alstom wins $193 million Lima rail contract

French energy and transport company Alstom has won a $193 million (130 million euro) contract to provide 19 metro trains for the Lima metropolitan transit network, the company announced on Thursday.

The Peruvian investment company, Proinversion, said the first phase of the long-term contract would be inaugurated in July 2011 and operate over 13 miles (21.6 kilometers) between the north and south suburbs of Lima, which has some eight million people.

Each of the metro trains will have five cars and be built in Alstom’s European factories, the company said in a press release. The first cars will be delivered in late 2012 and go into service the following year.

The cars will operate on the metro’s expanded above-ground network, which will eventually comprise 26 stations over 19 miles (32 kilometers) between Villa el Salvador in the south and San Juan de Lurigancho in the north.

Ultimately, Lima’s electric train network will include seven lines, although it took more than 20 years to complete the first line.

Greater Lima has tremendous traffic problems, but no underground metro. So far, the city has not yet decided whether it will build an underground system, although it started a feasibility study in 2010.