33 OMNEO Regio 2N EMUs For SNCF For The Hauts-de-France Region

On 22 December 2020, Bombardier Transportation announced that it has received an order for 33 ten-car OMNEO Regio 2N EMUs from SNCF, on behalf of the Hauts-de-France region. This order worth around 565 million EUR forms part of the framework agreement signed with SNCF in 2010 to provide up to of 860 OMNEO Regio 2N trains to the French regions.

The 135 m long trains will be built at the Crespin works and are scheduled for delivery between 2024 and 2025. Hauts-de-France intends to use them on the busiest lines of its network, in particular on services connecting Picardy and the Paris area. The new trains, equipped with ETCS, will also provide new services as part of the Picardie - Roissy project, which is planned to enter service in 2025.

The layout of these new OMNEOs has been adapted to allow 620 fixed seats and 12 bicycle spaces. Bombardier teams did specific work on the comfort of these new trains in conjunction with SNCF and Hauts-de-France. They will have new seats, a heated floor, an adapted accessibility for people with reduced mobility and suchlike.

The region will then have a fleet of 77 Bombardier-built trains of this family:
- 18 seven-car units delivered between 2014 and 2017 to the former Nord-Pas-de-Calais region,
- 7 ten-car units delivered in 2017 to the former Picardy region,
- 19 intercity type units ordered in 2018 as part of the transfer to the Hauts-de-France region of the intercity Paris - Amiens and Paris - Saint-Quentin - Maubeuge/Cambrai lines, which will be delivered in 2022 and 2023,
- 33 ten-car units ordered in December 2020.

To date, the French regions have ordered 491 trainsets from the OMNEO platform including 118 OMNEO Premium version trains for Centre-Val de Loire (32), Hauts-de-France (19), Normandy (67), 373 OMNEO Regio 2N trains for Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes (59), Bretagne (26), Centre-Val de Loire (16), Hauts-de-France (58), Ile-de-France (145), Nouvelle Aquitaine (24), Occitanie (18), Pays-de-la-Loire (11) and Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur (16).

On 17 October 2016 at Crespin, Bombardier Transportation handed over its 100th OMNEO train, designated 092M (a seven-car unit), to Xavier Bertrand, the President of Région Hauts-de-France, and SNCF Proximités Regional Director Jacky Lion. 

The OMNEO project began in 2008, when SNCF invited tenders for a large batch of high capacity double deck EMUs for local and middle-distance services. Then in 2010 SNCF awarded Bombardier a framework contract for up to 860 of these trains, designated Regio 2N by SNCF and the Régions. The OMNEO family includes a mix of six-, seven-, eight- and ten-car EMUs.

Letters indicate their lengths:

C - Courte (short, around 83 m) and Cm (around 81 m) for six-car trains,

M - Moyenne (medium, around 95 m) for seven-car trains,

L - Longue (long, around 110 m) for eight-car trains,

XL - eXtra-Longue (around 135 m) for ten-car trains.

These types are designated Classes Z 55500, 55600, 55700 and 56300 by SNCF. For example the 14 Aquitaine trains are numbered 401Cm to 414Cm and are also SNCF’s Z 56301/5607302 to Z 56327/5607328. Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur’s 010L is designated Z 55519/5507520 by SNCF. The only version designed for a top service speed of 200 km/h is the Class Z 56500 eight-car formation.

Bombardier has also developed a Premium version of the OMNEO. This is designed for a top service speed of 200 km/h, and has passenger accommodation styled for comfort on long intercity journeys.