Re: Letter received from Malcolm Kains (used to be STN KO)

["Paul Mansell" <pmansell@bigpond.com>]

It must be ironic that the NSW Transport Minister is called Carl Scully.
Somewhere he must have a sister called Dana, whose partner is Mulder, for
NSW has their very own X File that seems very mysterious.

Darren Yates <dyates@pnc.com.au> wrote in article
<894456926.543396@halibut.pnc.com.au>...
> I hope this is self-explanatory...
> Comments?
> 
> Darren Yates wrote:
> >
<snip>
> The rail industry in NSW has become corporatised and fragmented into
> numerous government and non government operators. All of these operators
> must negotiate their track access with the Rail Access Corporation (RAC)
> which is not part of SRA.
>
> Quite seperate to all of this is the STN. SRA produces STN's under
> contract to RAC. STN's are produced for the purpose of train working,
> planning and control and are for use by the operating professionals who
> require this information, they are not produced for the benefit of
> passengers or train enthusiasts. The point is that STN's are produced
> for all of the operators on NSW tracks and are the result of a
> contracted access agreement between the operator and the RAC. SRA or RAC
> has no business making this information public. It is up to the
> particular operator to make this information public if they so choose.

But when the operators are corporate bodies owned by the NSW Government
which is in turn 'owned' by any person resident in NSW and paying taxes,
don't the general public have a right to know if they want??? What about if
you lived in an area served by rail (or whose propery bordered or was
bisected by a railway line). Would they have a right to know if special
train movements were planned?

Does this also mean if that an RAC track in the electrified suburban area
was blocked by an NR (or other non-SRA) train, that the RAC is under no
obligation whatsoever to inform the SRA that peak services will be
disrupted? Does it also mean that when the SRA use the time-worn cliche of
'points failure' to explain late running, that the RAC could prosecute if
such late running was not due to a track failure? 


> The reason I asked for the STN's to be removed from this particular web
> site was not to deny train enthusiasts knowledge of train operations but
> to prevent SRA becoming involved in a dispute with RAC or any other
> operator because one of our employees illegally published details of
> their access agreements.

If they are unhappy about having running times published when they run over
what is considered PUBLIC PROPERTY, what a shame. Most heritage operators
go to great lengths to advertise their tours - the RTM even uses local
Sydney papers!!! 
This smacks of Big Brother - are they going to move nuclear waste by rail??
We are reminded constantly about the financial woes of the SRA, but when it
comes to their special train movements - forget it!

There's another argument running around about secret locations of special
trains - and that those deliquent vandals could use an STN to find a train
to vandalise it. Well, if a kid really wanted to trash a train, a public
timetable (or even opening their eyes) will yield plenty of useful
information. As for hiding a train, it's a bit like hiding an aeroplane -
there's not a lot of choices (it's got something to do with size and
access). Stiffer penalties for vandals of all ages (like JAIL, and a
substantial fine) just might work a bit better than not publishing
information. 

> You might also like to know that posting the STN's on the net was in
> breach of numerous guidelines such as commercial, code of conduct and
> law. The owner of this site was asked to take the STN's off but he
> refused. I can only say that he has done all train enthusiasts a great
> deal of harm.

What if the site owner was outside Australia? What provision of law would
prevent railway information from being published, in a country where sites
can carry pornography and anarchy?

I would agree that the layout of the STN (i.e. font, design, etc) is
copyright, just as much as the layout of White Pages phone book is
copyright to Telstra. However, the names of towns and suburbs (that are not
exclusive to SRA/RAC) and digits forming times and numbers are not
copyright. Think about the ramifications if they were - Sydney 2000 would
be Australia Post's copyright as they first assigned the postcode of 2000
some 30-40 years ago (and long before SOCOG, Olympics and Mr Knight). What
would be the position if somebody was to type the information into a
spreadsheet and posted that on the Web? 

> 
> Maybe one day the RAC will make train running information available to
> all train enthusiasts on its own web site. But unfortunately, in the
> meantime it is still illegal for any of us to publish STN's on the net
> or anywhere else.

Maybe one day the RAC, SRA, etc. etc. could be restructured. Given the NSW
Governments current popularity it could be sooner than you think. 

> 
> I hope this answers your question and clears the air. Please feel free
> to contact me if you require any further assistance.
> 
> Malcolm Kains.
> 
> 
> --
> -----------------------------
> Darren Yates
> Technical Editor - I.T. and ICON
> Sydney Morning Herald
> 
> 
>