Re: [NSW] Carl Scully: "Everytime you buy a train ticket..."

[Rob McDonald <robert.mcdonald@kilo.uws.edu.au>]

At 17:15 23/03/00 +1100, ERIKA wrote:
>Irrespective of the GST what is going on now ,under the current fare
system
>is not what we are paying for:
>1.late services and to compensate trains missing stations(without
>communication.
>2.train drivers and controllers making there own rules ,kiiling people
3.
>dirty overlayden services
>4. mugging of customers when there are people paid to protect them not
>knowing what is going on.
>5. trains running off the lines by employees incompedience.
>6.ranting responsible politicans who rarely go near the trains blaming
>someone else.
>These are the things politicans should be worried about.
>
>--
>Erika<erika@torpan.com>
>Manly,Sydney,Australia.
><homepage at<www.torpan.com>
>Fax:::1 9492 776387
>ViaGodias
>"C. Dewick" <craigd@lios.apana.org.au> wrote in message
>8b66d5$gah$1@jedi.apana.org.au">news:8b66d5$gah$1@jedi.apana.org.au...

Erika, like you I am thoroughly fed up with appalling train services.
Perhaps unlike you, I came within about 5 metres of one of the worst of
them on 2.12.99 when 7 people sitting in front of me were smashed to
death near Glenbrook.

I am very angry too about continuing to take my life into my hands every
weekday since (I hardly ever try to get around by rail on weekends in
the Blue Mountains some time ago, after regular messages of "delays up
to 60 minutes", which turn into even longer delay). I am fed up with the
panic I have experienced when going through failed signals since (3
times) or going down the up line without explanation (2 times), or
travelling with another train breathing up the arse of my train (at
least 2 times, including yesterday, when a train was delayed at Lawson
for much time while they fixed a trip hose).

I would be angry about train drivers and controllers who made up their
own rules and killed people.

But I am also angry about your comment about "train drivers and
controllers making there own rules, kiiling people". The Glenbrook
Inquiry is still in progress. There are many factors that contributed to
the accident, and many of these factors were not the responsibility of
train drivers or controllers. I believe it is fair to wait for all
evidence to be presented before you make any judgement. In fact
individual blame will be assessed only at the forthcoming coronial
inquiries, so you may have to wait some time. The current inquiry is
still finding out all the things that went wrong, in spite of a lack of
cooperation from people high up in CityRail and Rail Access Corporation,
and it is not intended as a witch hunt for assigning individual blame.

Some managers within CityRail and Rail Access Corporation will love you
for blaming individuals, as they have been trying to sheet all or most
of the blame onto the driver from the outset.

Feel free to vent your anger at Simon Lane, CEO of CityRail, who tried
to preempt findings of any inquiries by telling the media that
suggestions of inadequate signalling were "absolutely scurrilous". Feel
free to ask why he said this even though the controllers you denigrate
had previously written to him to tell him otherwise. Feel free to vent
your anger at the other people in CityRail and RAC who have hindered the
inquiry but didn't get their name or address splashed across the dailies
the way the drivers at Glenbrook did.

The fact of the matter is that some controllers have been trying to tell
CityRail management of signalling and other inadequacies for some time,
and have been ignored. Another fact of the matter is that lack of
maintenance of a fuse box sparked the whole thing off. Another fact of
the matter is that drivers had made several attempts to get the brakes
fixed on the car in question, without success. There are many drivers,
controllers and other CityRail staff who do care about you, but are
working within a system that prevents them from providing you with a
safe and reliable service. Life is pretty frustrating for them too.

Please wait and see the Inquiry report before you make what may turn out
be a libellous statement.

Rob McDonald
Hazelbrook