Railway Vehicles Manufacturing in Türkiye and the Role of TURASAS
Authors: Yazar Mustafa Metin 
Published: December 2022

Railways is a transportation model that has been attracting increasing attention in recent years due to its environmental awareness, long-term fixed price guarantee unlike other modes of transportation, being the most suitable type of transportation for heavy tonnage and bulky loads in terms of physical and cost, being reliable, not being affected by bad weather conditions, etc. The global rail transport industry is growing, pushing the demand of the rolling stock industry to growth in recent years. An increasing momentum is expected to continue in the next few years, due to the increase in both passenger and rail freight transport. In Türkiye, TCDD Taşımacılık A.Ş. needs 233 high-speed train/high-speed train sets, 125 Electric Train Sets (EMU), 930 electric locomotives, 146 diesel locomotives, 24.000 freight wagons, 62 sets of urban vehicles (Başkentray and Marmaray) by 2050. The total cost of all these vehicles is estimated to be at least 17.4 billion Euros. Investments to be made in rail system vehicles in the medium and long term will contribute greatly to the development of the local and national rail system vehicle industry in our country. In order to develop the R&D, design and production capabilities of the domestic industry, to manufacture, maintain and repair all kinds of rail system vehicles and their sub-components, based on the domestic and national production and design of rail system vehicles and increasing the rate of domesticity in their critical components, TÜRASAŞ, which was established as the relevant institution of the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure by merging of TÜLOMSAŞ, TÜVASAŞ and TÜDEMSAŞ, the three subsidiaries of TCDD, set out with the mission of ensuring stable growth by reaching a wider product range with technology-intensive productions that steer the sector with a new perspective and synergy consisting of the merger of three subsidiaries and it has become the biggest representative of the rail systems sector in our country with its experience of more than a hundred years, knowledge, approximately 4000 trained manpower, integrated facilities producing national and domestic technologies, 2 R&D Centers located in Eskişehir and Sakarya Regional Directorate in a total area of 400 thousand m². TÜRASAŞ, which has a wide product range, carries out domestic and national design and production studies of rail system vehicles such as various types of shunting locomotives (diesel electric, diesel hydraulic, electric, hybrid), mainline locomotives (diesel electric, diesel hydraulic, electric), train sets (diesel, electric), suburban trains, wagons (passenger, freight) and TÜRASAŞ is also working to localize many critical subcomponents of these vehicles, especially systems such as diesel engine, traction motor, traction converter, TCMS (Train Control and Management System) or to increase their localization rates. With the domestic and national production of these works, imports will be prevented and a large amount of foreign currency will be kept in our country. When the maintenance and spare parts costs are taken into consideration, the profit provided by domestic and national production increases even more.