  We study the local equilibrium in the central $V = 125$ fm$^3$ cell in
heavy-ion collisions at energies from 10.7 AGeV (AGS) to 160 AGeV (SPS)
calculated in the microscopic transport model. In the present paper the hadron
yields and energy spectra in the cell are compared with those of infinite
nuclear matter, as calculated within the same model. The agreement between the
spectra in the two systems is established for times $t \geq 10$ fm/$c$ in the
central cell. The cell results do not deviate noticeably from the infinite
matter calculations with rising incident energy, in contrast to the apparent
discrepancy with predictions of the statistical model (SM) of an ideal hadron
gas. The entropy of this state is found to be very close to the maximum
entropy, while hadron abundances and energy spectra differ significantly from
those of the SM.
