[NSW CityRail +] World coming to an end!

["Gnome 412" <gnome412@hotmail.com>]

Went for a brief ride on CityRail this morning, aiming to catch the 07:37
from Kogarah to Central.

At Kogarah, the four-car train from Thirroul that normally passes at 07:29
on the Illawarra showed up on the Illawarra Local about 5 minutes later than
that.  There were clear and courteous human announcements that the 07:28
would depart from platform 3 (Up Illawarra), that the 07:37 could be delayed
five minutes and that CityRail apologised for the inconvenience and delay.
Half the disgruntled customers on platform 1 (Up Illawarra Local) trudged to
platform 3 so as to stand up on a "fast" train and save five minutes.

The 07:37 showed up 2 minutes late with seats a-plenty.  It was delayed at
Sydenham while an employee gave a piece of paper to the driver and while the
following 8-car V set overtook on the Illawarra Local (so it was heading
"over the top" at Illawarra Junction !).  My train eventually stopped
between St Peters and Erskineville for 5 minutes.

The gentleman beside me explained LOUDLY to his wife that there were always
signal failures, that the whole system was on the point of collapse, and
that the unfortunate election of a union-dominated government was the
problem.

The girl behind me got on her mobile phone to say she would be an hour late
for work because the trains were all broken down again.

The train guard announced that there would be a ten minute delay because
there was a defective rail between Erskineville and Redfern, that it was
being repaired, that trains were proceeding at a very cautious speed, and
that CityRail regretted and apologised for the ten minute delay.

A flagman (or are they flaggers now?) stopped the train at Erskineville and
we proceeded past a group of fettlers at the junction at a very careful 1 to
2 km/h.  The gentleman beside me was still blaming the Labor Party signals.

The train arrived at Central 15 minutes late.

This is trivial railway news.

What impresses me is
Positive:
I've never heard such a magnificent attempt to keep passengers informed of
the nature and likely duration of a delay, and to express CityRail's regret
etc.
I've rarely seen such smart working as swapping the Wollongong trains to the
IL so they could bypass the queue for the ESR at Erskineville - I can
remember past avoidable delays of hours.

Negative:
The customers, having read either the Terrorgraph or aus.rail, all perceive
that if one train is late, all trains are late.  An expert on signal
failures probably had more credibility than the guard in our car.  The girl
who was going to be an hour late might have been 45 minutes late before she
joined the train.

A network which runs about 160 electric trains in the peak hours is bound to
have a few delays.  This delay seemed to be six trains for up to 15 minutes.
Bad, but not horrifying.

The problem now seems (post-Glenbrook, post-Terrorgraph) that even when the
delay is short and the apologies sincere and profuse, the customers just
assume that the entire system has stopped again.

Rgds