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France spends $20 billion on ‘too wide’ trains that don’t fit in their stations

Don’t mind the gap! Because there won’t be one.

France’s national train operator, SNCF, made a pretty big ‘faux pas’ when a fleet of new trains was ordered without double-checking their measurements, Gawker reports. According to officials, the new trains are too big and they will not fit through many of France's train stations. That's one pretty big "oops!"

So, in order to fix the problem railway employees are working to widen the tracks in over 1,000 stations. What’s another $50 million to spend on a $20 billion train upgrade plan that someone already botched by not measuring the new trains, right?

“We discovered the problem a bit late,” said Réseau Ferré de France (RFF) spokesman, Christophe Piednoël. “It’s as if you bought a Ferrari and when you come to park it in your garage you realize your garage isn't exactly the right size for a Ferrari because you didn't have a Ferrari before."

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According to the Wall Street Journal, 1,300 of France’s 8,700 railway platforms will be adjusted to accommodate the new trains.

Apparently the measurements that the RFF provided for the new trains strictly applied to modern train stations built in the last thirty years. With the train system being a staple for transportation in France, there are definitely some stations that are much older than that.

A report will be published next week with input from both Alstom and Bombardier, the two companies that manufactured the new trains, on details about how the colossal mistake was made and when the projects to fix it will commence.

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