My sources on the cost of the E project were the same public announcements that everybody else uses and on the basis of the contract extension which should be tram plus maintenance only, it places the figure around $13-14 million per tram. Daniel may well be onto something though. $5 or 6 million for the Australian market plus development costs would be nearer what one would expect. Given that it was created off an existing Bombardier platform should mean that the development costs werent too high.

It would be good if they did clarify what the actual base tram costs. It would save the E from standing out like a sore thumb in international tram cost comparisons I've seen done in Europe! It's this terrible commercial secrecy we have here. I can find out the cost of an Australian tram more easily from European sources than from here, though I haven't been able to crack the E nor the Gold Coast trams which are buried in a whole project contract price. I bet though that Bombardier supplied them to themselves at European production cost - about $4 million or so each.

Tony P