International Railroad Discussion > Cuban homemade rail buses. 2002

The FCC (Cuban Railway) was operating a variety of homebuilt railbuses when I visited there in 2002. Many were constructed by Taino, a Cuban railcar company. Their main source of parts seems to have been Ikarus transit buses built in huge numbers in the Eastern Bloc nations in the 1970's. The trailer has obvious US origins, built out of a 1950's GM or Mack transit coach. Shown in and around Trinidad, Cuba.

The origin of the larger homebuilt railbus shown at Trinidad is less obvious, but the small railbuses shown at Trinidad and Maltiempo appears to be the rear portions of Ikarus articulated ("bendy") buses.

The red railbus includes the front of a Skoda truck, and an Ikarus body. A large Taino railbus is shown crossing the main road at Camaguey, note the concrete crossing tower behind the bus.

Finally, an older railbus of undetermined origin at Moron (pronounced "Mo-rown")

Pieces of Ikarus transit buses also were adapted for further road use, as in the Ford truck conversion.

In the late 2000's, a new plan for transport was initiated by the Government in Cuba. This involved a large number of both highway and transit buses being imported from China.

In rural areas, the services provided by FCC railbuses were supposed to be replaced by air conditioned highway buses from China.
This would allow for the abandonment of some rail lines.

The Chinese buses didn't stand up well to rural roads in Cuba, causing unreliable service to a large population which relies on public transport across the island. Some railbus service has supposed to have returned.

In Havana itself, modern transit supplied by one of the European bus operating franchises has seen modern transit buses replace the "camels" (truck and trailer buses, using International trucks and huge trailers constructed from Ikarus bodies).

Looks like the one was made from a GM old look body.

Yea….communisim really works well.

Chris