Three Austrian states jointly tender new trains for local railways

Salzburg, Styria and Tyrol will jointly tender new vehicles for the Pinzgau Railway, the Murtal Railway and the Zillertal Railway, ORF reports. The three narrow-gauge private railways are preparing to replace diesel locomotives with electric locomotives or battery-hybrid operation.

The joint tender is expected to create financial synergies in the purchase and maintenance of the vehicles, according to the three state governments and the federal government.

The decision follows an increase in the Transport Ministry’s medium-term investment programme for private railways. Under the federal coalition’s 2027-2028 budget, funding will rise by 25 million euros from 2027, bringing the total to about 114 million euros. The ministry has also promised to cover part of the cost of the new fleets for the three states.

Transport Minister Peter Hanke welcomed the joint tender, calling the decision by Salzburg, Styria and Tyrol “a model example of the efficient use of public funds”.

The Pinzgau Railway runs about 53 kilometres from Zell am See station to Vorderkrimml. The Zillertal Railway is a 32-kilometre narrow-gauge line between Jenbach and Mayrhofen. The Murtal Railway runs 76 kilometres from Unzmarkt to Mauterndorf in Salzburg’s Lungau region and climbs 390 metres in elevation.

Tyrol’s transport councillor René Zumtobel said the three states were writing “railway history” together. He said cooperation with the federal government had allowed the tender documents to be harmonised so that all three railways could benefit and achieve substantial savings. His counterparts Claudia Holzer in Styria and Stefan Schnöll in Salzburg also backed the joint approach, which they said would create synergies at several levels. The tender is expected shortly.

The future of the Zillertal Railway had been the subject of intense political debate in Tyrol. Officials led by Franz Hörl, chairman of the supervisory board of Zillertaler Verkehrsbetriebe AG, had initially planned to convert the diesel railway to hydrogen power. The project was abandoned because of additional costs. A review by TU Wien subsequently identified a hybrid train powered by batteries and partly by overhead lines as the best option. Tyrol’s coalition government agreed on that model.