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New Train Cars From CRRC Springfield Factory To Be On The Tracks This Week

Orange Line subway car under construction
WAMC

   New subway cars made at a factory in Springfield, Massachusetts will make a long awaited debut this week on the transit system in greater Boston.

   The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority announced Monday the first new Orange Line trains will go into passenger service by midday Wednesday.

   The roll out of the new trains has been delayed numerous times since Gov. Charlie Baker attended a ceremony last December to see the first pair of rail cars come off the assembly line at the CRRC factory.

   "The cars these are replacing have been on the system since the '70s and have over 2 million miles on them," said Baker.

   The Springfield factory has a contract to build 152 new cars to replace the existing Orange Line fleet and to assemble 252 new subway cars for the MBTA’s Red Line.

The record-setting tenure of Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno. The 2011 tornado and its recovery that remade the largest city in Western Massachusetts. The fallout from the deadly COVID outbreak at the Holyoke Soldiers Home. Those are just a few of the thousands and thousands of stories WAMC’s Pioneer Valley Bureau Chief Paul Tuthill has covered for WAMC in his nearly 17 years with the station.