Australian Rail Standards [Was: Re: April Digest - congrats Max Michell]

[Peter Homann <"peter.homann"@@prr.org.au>]

Maurie Daly wrote:
> Im not convinced that the only model is to hand the whole show over to
> the Feds ,(as everyone else seems to beleive) .
> Whats really needed is major rail reform , which doesnt also mean
> federal control.
> What is needed is a single common set of rules which all the Railways
> (irrespective of who owns them ) , operate by.
> Given that there is a trend now by each State Govt to privatise parts
> of its Rail network maybe its possible to head in the direction of the
> US rail model.
> In this case the only role of the Feds would be to set national
> standards, which all rail operators ,either State owned or privately
> leased would operate by.
> No one can convince me that having separate rules and differant access
> regimes and differant safeworking in every state is a good thing for
> the country.
> 
> Comments
> MD

There is already an Australian Standard covering the rail industry. 4292
IIRC.
Split into several parts, it covers rollingstock design and maintenance,
track (perway) design and maintenance, management standards,
documentation standards, etc.
That, I believe, is the reference document for states' rail
accreditation processes.
The problem is that most states have written different legislation, and
have different accreditation bodies, so it becomes somewhat time
consuming and expensive to gain accreditation in multiple states.
National accreditation, ie apply for and get accredited in [state], and
you're automatically accredited in every other state, would probably
save the industry lots of $$ [insert figure here]. Of course, while each
state Gov't gets fees for acreditation in their own state, they're not
going to give up that income stream...
Sorry, I'm getting cynical about politicians again.

Road rules are different in most states, so why not safeworking? Then
again, that's probably a good argument for uniform national road
rules...

In summary, its probably fair to say that a lot of the process of
nationalising rail access is in place, it just needs a little leadership
to bash states' heads together and actually become uniform (which was
*supposed* to happen a few years ago when all this accreditation
business started).

Cheers for now.
-- 
============================
 Peter Homann
============================
The light at the end of the tunnel will be turned off
until economic conditions improve.  Management.