Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. has placed an order for 1,000 new high-capacity grain cars from Hamilton-based National Steel Car.

Canadian Pacific is expecting to have more than 500 new grain hopper cars in service before the end of 2018 and expects to order a total of 5,900 of the grain hoppers over the next four years.

Few details about the cost of the new grain hopper cars were released, Canadian Pacific announcing that it plans to invest more than half a billion dollars as part of its commitment to the North American agricultural sector.

The new cars were ordered to enable a complete removal of all low-capacity hoppers from the Canadian Pacific fleet.

According to a release from the company the new car design is shorter, lighter and can carry more grain than the cars that are set to be retired.

This is the second contract for National Steel Car in recent months. Canadian National Railway Co. announced a similar order of 1,000 hopper cars back in May. Both companies have said that their orders were facilitated by federal government changes that encourage railways to make investments to avert service disruptions.