Colombia's rail revival: CAF loan funds reform as RegioTram advances

Lire en français : Colombie : le RegioTram de Occidente attend ses trains CRRC en 2027

Colombia's rail revival is being built more on institutions than on new corridors for now. A USD 300m CAF loan approved in October 2025 funds rail reform, while the RegioTram de Occidente near Bogotá, the first project to reach heavy construction, expects Chinese-built trains in early 2027.

CAF, the Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean, approved the loan of up to USD 300m to the Republic of Colombia at its board meeting on 10 October 2025, the bank said in a statement. CAF here is the lender, not the Spanish train maker of the same initials.

The money supports a programme for railway reactivation, sustainable mobility and logistics efficiency. According to CAF, it covers a modernised legal and institutional framework for rail, including the creation of a National Railway Agency and possible declarations of projects of strategic importance, as well as cleaner urban and regional transport, road safety and river and intermodal freight. The National Planning Department coordinates it with the transport and trade ministries.

A loan without named lines

An earlier version of this article tied the loan to six priority rail corridors. The CAF statement names no line, corridor or project, so that link has been removed. Read against its stated components, the programme funds policy and institutional reform rather than track, trains or signalling on a given route.

That distinction matters. A rail agency and updated laws can make future concessions bankable, but they do not move freight on their own. The physical work is happening elsewhere, through regional authorities and concessions.

RegioTram moves to testing in 2027

The most advanced scheme is the RegioTram de Occidente, a 40 km electric regional line linking Bogotá with Funza, Mosquera, Madrid and Facatativá. The department of Cundinamarca said on 11 June 2026 that Governor Jorge Rey had agreed a plan with builder CCECC and concessionaire CFRO to open about ten new work fronts and lift the workforce from 1,200 to nearly 4,000.

The trains come from CRRC's plant in Changchun. The first will be shipped in the first quarter of 2027 for trial running, and the maker has committed to deliver 22 cars before the end of June 2027, the department said. The first phase, 26 km between Facatativá and Fontibón, is due to open in the second half of 2027, with the extension into central Bogotá planned for 2029, the governor told Blu Radio.

Guangzhou Metro Group will run the line. Concessionaire CFRO signed the operating agreement in Guangzhou on 12 June 2026, according to the department, which says the group runs 19 metro lines and 620 trains in China and operates the Orange Line in Lahore, Pakistan.

Other South American freight networks are also being reshaped, as in Argentina, which plans to re-tender its Fepsa and Ferrosur Roca concessions. In Colombia, the next visible step is the arrival of the first CRRC trains for testing in early 2027.

Sources: CAF press release (10/10/2025); Department of Cundinamarca (11/06/2026); Department of Cundinamarca (12/06/2026); Blu Radio (03/06/2026).

Photo: the Tren de la Sabana in Bogotá, October 2019. Felipe Restrpo Acosta, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

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