SEPTA is adding more railcars to its Regional Rail fleet, buying 24 used Bombardier Comets passenger trains from the Montreal public transportation system, Exo.<\/p>\n
Exo approved SEPTA’s $8.58 million bid for the coach cars at its March board meeting, according to a news release. Funding comes from the roughly $220 million allocated by Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro<\/a>\u00a0last year to support safety and infrastructure upgrades.<\/p>\n “We are grateful for Gov. Shapiro’s continued support of SEPTA, and we are committed to continuing to deliver improvements for our customers,” SEPTA General Manager Scott Sauer said in a statement. “These additional railcars will help us enhance reliability and expand capacity for our customers while we work toward replacing our aging Regional Rail fleet.”<\/p>\n SEPTA said the Bombardier railcars will operate within its existing fleet of ACS-64 electric locomotives. The used railcars were originally manufactured in the late 1980s, according to SEPTA.<\/p>\n The transit authority aims to release a timeline of when the railcars will be placed into service later this spring.<\/p>\n The purchase comes as SEPTA continues to recover after five of its Silverliner IV railcars caught fire last year<\/a>.<\/p>\n SEPTA was ordered by the Federal Railroad Administration to inspect all 233 of its Silverliner IV fleet after the fires.<\/p>\n Regional Rail service was impacted during the inspections, leading to delays and service suspensions on the line.<\/p>\n Federally-mandated inspections on the Silverliner IV fleet were completed<\/a>\u00a0on Nov. 14, 2025, and evening express service<\/a> returned 10 days later.\u00a0Morning express service<\/a> returned in January.\u00a0<\/p>\n Earlier this year, SEPTA rented 10 railcars from Maryland Area Rail Commuter<\/a>, a rail system serving Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, and placed the trains into service.<\/p>\n