Bombardier Double-deck Coach

Bi level passenger rail car

The Double deck Coach is a bilevel passenger railcar currently manufactured by Alstom, which acquired Bombardier Transportation in 2021 (and before that by Adtranz and DWA/Waggonbau Görlitz) used by various European railways and Israel Railways. The current generation of double deck coaches can be run at speeds up to 200 km/h (125 mph). Depending on their configuration, each coach can seat 100 to 150 passengers.

The ancestry of these coaches can be traced back to the LBE double deck coaches (de:Doppelstock Stromlinien Wendezug der LBE) built by WUMAG at Görlitz for the Lübeck–Büchen–Hamburg railway in 1935–36. They were push pull trains with a cab car that could control the steam locomotive at the other end of the train. After World War II, these coaches were developed further by VEB Waggonbau Görlitz (formerly WUMAG) into double deck trains of two to five articulated cars sharing bogies, known as "Doppelstock(glieder)züge" (de:Gliederzug (Schiene)). Like the successor 1st generation units, many of these coaches were sold to several railways in the Eastern Bloc, such as in Romania where they are still operated as TE Acvila coaches. Deutsche Bundesbahn of West Germany now opted only for single level coaches and multiple units until its purchase of the 2nd generation Class 760 double deck coaches in the early 1990s. Starting in 1974, single coaches were built again that were the direct ancestors of today's double deck coaches. These trainsets were used by Deutsche Reichsbahn (East Germany) as well as several other railways of the Eastern Bloc in large numbers (about 4000). After 1990, VEB Waggonbau Görlitz became part of Deutsche Waggonbau AG (DWA) which was acquired by Bombardier Transportation in 1998. Bombardier Inc. sold their railway division to Alstom in 2021.

In 2008, Bombardier presented the "Dosto 2010" future family of double deck trains for the German market. For international sales they were branded as Bombardier TWINDEXX with a "Vario" concept (then called TWINDEXX Vario) that allows these trains to be built for regional or intercity connections with a design speed of 189 km/h and an operational speed of up to 160 km/h. Deutsche Bahn and other German operators currently operate 404 TWINDEXX Vario carriages, classified as DBAG Class 445/446, which entered service in 2017 after a delay of three years, replacing many locomotive hauled rakes. Israel Railways has also ordered 443 TWINDEXX Vario carriages between 2010 and 2019 to support its expanding rail network, the last of which was delivered in December 2021. The high speed rail versions are branded TWINDEXX Express, designed for 230 km/h. A tilting EMU variant of the Twindexx with an operational speed of up to 200 km/h is developed for the Swiss Federal Railways named SBB RAB(D)e 502, nicknamed FV Dosto and informally called TWINDEXX Swiss Express. Orders have been placed in the range of a few hundred coaches of the different variants with their initial delivery originally to be around 2013, then delayed to 2015–2017 and eventually 2018–2022, depending on the variant. These delays have been attributed to the need to redesign the trains to properly comply with Swiss disability access legislation after a lawsuit was filed against Bombardier and SBB by two Swiss disability rights organisations at the Federal Administrative Court of Switzerland in 2012, as well as problems with the composting toilet tanks and the tilting mechanisms. In 2022, SBB decided to permanently discontinue the use of the tilting mechanism on their FV Dosto trains. The National Railway Company of Belgium (NMBS/SNCB) has similarly ordered TWINDEXX derived intercity trains designated as M7 in 2018, constructed at the former BN factory at Bruges, which entered service in January 2020. In 2007, Koleje Mazowieckie of Poland signed a contract for the delivery of 37 Twindexx Vario wagons (11 steering and 26 trailing wagons). The centre wagons were delivered in August and the steering wagons in December 2008. Initially, the wagons were pulled by EU07 locomotives. The wagons are currently operated by Koleje Mazowieckie together with TRAXX P160DC and Pesa Gama locomotives, sometimes also in multiple working with pl bilevel coaches. Israel Railways Class Vmax count UIC type notes?16060Ordered in 2016?16033Ordered in 2017?16048Ordered in late 2017. (electric only)?16074Ordered in May 2019. (electric only)