Munich / Memmingen - be careful, the British are coming - or not: The company Go-Ahead Bayern, which is to replace Deutsche Bahn on the Munich-Memmingen-Lindau route from the end of the year, is in trouble.
The trains are missing.
The background is a real business crime.
Winfried Karg, spokesman for Go-Ahead, is still trying to be optimistic: Go-Ahead will start in December.
“Definitely,” emphasizes Karg.
The question, however, is which trains Go-Ahead will use.
The delivery of 22 Flirt locomotives from the Swiss manufacturer Stadler has actually been firmly agreed.
Around 15 have already been manufactured in the Pankow plant near Berlin and are distributed around the capital on shunting tracks.
Ready for pickup.
But now Stadler has declared that it will not deliver the trains to Go-Ahead.
Because the British, who are new to the Bavarian rail market, have come up with an unusual solution for train maintenance that Stadler doesn't like at all.
Instead of setting up a workshop themselves, the British decided to hire the Russian company Transmashholding International.
For the first time, TMHI has a foot in the door of the German rail market and is building a workshop in Langweid near Augsburg for the maintenance of the go-ahead trains.
Stadler fears industrial espionage
Stadler fears, however, that knowledge of rail technology could flow to Russia if they have to deliver maintenance books for the Flirt trains.
The suspicion of industrial espionage is in the air.
The contract between Stadler and Go-Ahead prohibits subcontracting maintenance services to a competitor of Stadler, stressed Stadler in a press release.
TMHI is one of the largest vehicle manufacturers in Russia "and therefore a competitor".
"This means that the contractual conditions on the part of Go-Ahead Bayern are not met."
Personal animosities between the former Siemens manager Hans Schubert, now head of TMHI, and the long-time Stadler boss Peter Spuhler are said to have fueled the dispute. In any case, until now, “the fundamental differences could not be bridged”, explained Go-Ahead. "The next steps are now being prepared", says Go-Ahead managing director Patrick Verwer - without going into details. That can mean that Go-Ahead goes looking for trains to lease until the conflict is resolved. It won't be easy. Because the safety certificate issued by the Federal Railway Authority only allows Go-Ahead to drive between Munich and Lindau with locomotives - but not with locomotive-hauled units. Locomotives are difficult to rent on the rail market.Even the top dog, Deutsche Bahn, has a hard time - with the result that rental vehicles from North Rhine-Westphalia sometimes drove on the Munich S-Bahn tracks, the height of which did not match the level of the platforms on the main line.
The Bavarian Ministry of Transport is keeping a close eye on developments. The legal disputes were "not hidden" from the responsible Bavarian Railway Company (BEG), spokesman Wolfgang Oeser told our newspaper. The BEG expects Stadler and Go-Ahead to resolve their differences "immediately". Both companies had also signaled this to the BEG. If that does not succeed, then it is the job of Go-Ahead to present an alternative plan.
