Officials at the Docklands Light Railway (DLR) in London are planning for new trains that will increase capacity by more than 30 percent, be more reliable and provide customers with real-time information, air conditioning and mobile device charging points.
Transport for London (TfL) plans to order 43 of the 87-meter-long trains. Of those, 33 will replace the existing older trains.
“These new trains will enable us to increase capacity on the DLR by 30%, significantly improving the comfort, reliability and quality of our service for customers,” Danny Price, TfL’s Director of DLR, said in a news release. “Ordering them now ensures that we get the best value for money in the long term and can support continuing growth in east London. We intend to go out to tender later this year with the new trains entering service from 2022.”
Significant redevelopment is taking place in and around the Docklands area, and passenger use is set to continue to grow when the DLR network interchanges with the Elizabeth line from 2018. TfL plans to replace two-thirds of the existing trains, some of which are 25 years old, and order an additional ten new trains to provide even more capacity.
DLR is celebrating its 30th anniversary later this year.
The line began operating on Aug. 31, 1987, initially running with just 11 trains serving 15 stations. In its first year of operation, it carried 6.7 million people. Today, the railway has 45 stations, 38 km of track and 56 trains and carries 122 million passengers a year.
