Elron chiefs admit: trains destined to lack space

Photo: Liis Treimann

At yesterday’s press conference, heads of Elron owned up to the fact that the trains will continue to lack seats. In the future, the problem with bicycles looms.

«Estonians ought to be satisfied, as, having conferred with trains suppliers in neighbouring countries, Estonia is among the few states with entire trains fleet replaced within a single year. This is huge,» the Elron chairman Toivo Promm told the journalists, adding he’d expect passengers to have a little patience.

According to Elron board member Riho Seppar, the new trains are wider than the old ones. «While they say it’s tight to sit, our trains are 3.5 metres wide; the old ones were three metres in width,» said Mr Seppar. He assured the seats were wider than prescribed by EU requirements.

«We could have gone the way of the old trains, installing a narrow seat and saying these will handle three persons. We chose not to go down that road,» said Mr Seppar. According to him, every seat has armrests – for comfort. The new trains are state-of-the-art, technically: storing energy while breaking, for instance. «Even Europe has no such trains right now,» claimed the man.

For routes with larger numbers of passengers, Elron promises lengthened trains. «Lengthening of trains will look like this: two trains will be linked together. That’ll take about three minutes; it’s done automatically, this can be done by the driver,» Mr Seppar proceeded to describe. Combined trains of this sort ought to still have room at the 150 metres long passenger platforms.

Should somebody desire to exit at a station fitted with a short platform, this must be done through the middle door of the front train – there, the other doors will remain shut.  If the person in question happened to embark on his journey in the back train of the duo, the conductor (seller of tickets) will direct him to the right car; if needed, change of cars should be performable during a stop in a station.

As admitted by Mr Seppar, bicycles will probably pose a problem in the summer – even though ten spaces are provided. «This problem will probably persist, as we cannot create an area with bikes only, and no seats,» he said. According to Mr Seppar, the problem could perhaps be solved, somewhat, by fitting stations with bike parks. Asked if, from now on, bikes need separate train tickets, Mr Seppar said no – nor the time being.

According to Elron CEO Andrus Ossip, the new trains are technically impeccable; even so, problems have occurred with onboard information systems. «The problem being: as the information system is GPS-based, Estonia has places amongst the forests where catching satellite signals is problematic,» he explained, adding that the system has been updated by now, for enhanced reliability.

Regarding problems with ticket sales, Mr Ossip said Elron had, since 11 pm on December 31^st, three hours to fix the ticket sales system according to the schedule. «We knew we were short of time and errors were likely to occur while synchronising data. We have been busy correcting the mistakes and, by now, I can say that most of the major mistakes have been corrected,» said he.

The new diesel trains schedule entered into force on January 1^st; according to Mr Ossip, it will again change on June 1^st. «In weeks to come, we will add departures. A good example would be the Rapla-Tallinn direction, where, currently, people are able to reach Tallinn by 7:30 am, or a few minutes till 9 am,» said Mr Ossip. Before lengthening any of the said trains, said he, Elron is planning to add one. «The people will be spread out between these trains,» said he.

According to Mr Ossip, long distance trains might offer catering; even so, this could only be done by removing some seats. «Should we want to do that well, it would take new investments. Looking at the feedback from these past days, we will have to see if this is worthwhile, to remove six seats? Maybe we should keep these in place, rather,» said Mr Ossip.