Vehicle Delivery

KC Streetcar vehicle #1 arrives in town

Members of the KC Streetcar team recently traveled to Elmira, N.Y., to visit with the streetcar vehicle manufacturer, CAF. This is part of an ongoing series of regular visits by City staff to the manufacturing facility to meet with the vehicle team and see vehicle production progress.

Ralph Davis, the streetcar project manager from the Public Works Department, made the trip, along with KC Streetcar Authority Director Tom Gerend. This is Tom’s first trip to the CAF facility.

Recently, CAF was told by the City that its proposed change in the vehicle delivery schedule was unacceptable. In response, the City has been working with CAF to help it find ways to keep the current vehicle build-out and delivery schedule, or to lessen the proposed delay. It’s during this visit that staff was able to work with CAF in renegotiating the streetcar  vehicle #1 delivery date to October 29, 2015.  These negotiations led to an estimated savings of 4 weeks on the delivery schedule recently reported to staff.  Delivery dates for the remaining vehicles is still in process.

In addition to schedule discussion, Ralph and Tom toured the facility, met with the crews and checked on the manufacturing progress of the KC Streetcar vehicle

Public updates on the KC Streetcar Vehicle Delivery process were made on Thursday, August 27, at the following meetings:

• Monthly KC Streetcar Authority Board meeting
  • The KC Streetcar Authority Board meets monthly from 12:00pm-1:00pm at the KC Port Authority Office.
• City Council business session.
  • Rebroadcasts can be seen on City Government Channel 2 and online at www.kcmo.gov.

While schedule negotiations with CAF continue, KCMO has made significant progress on expediting delivery of the streetcar vehicles.  It’s important to note that the delivery schedule is contingent upon a successful testing phase at the plant. The actions that CAF is taking to ensure the October 29 delivery date are:

• Adding a second production shift to address critical choke points in the manufacturing process
• Place a dedicated manufacturing engineer on the shop floor in order to quickly address any issues that occur.
• Work with KCMO through the remainder of the testing process to identify and resolve any issues that may impact the delivery date.

City staff will conduct weekly meetings to monitor progress and implementation of factory process improvements. They will also work to identify additional opportunities for improvement.

To read the full release, click here.