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Foes of Proposed Light-Rail Line in Seattle Area File Lawsuit to Halt Work
Seattle Times
05/18/2002
Foes of Sound Transit’s proposed light-rail line filed suit yesterday to block the project, arguing it’s illegal because the scaled-back line isn’t the same project voters approved in 1996.
In a complaint filed in King County Superior Court, the opposition coalition Sane Transit and its vice chairman, Mark Baerwaldt, contend Sound Transit can’t legally spend money on the 14-mile line without another public vote.
“Sound Transit is asking the voters to accept a light-rail system that is substantially different from, and markedly inferior to, the one that they were promised they would receive when they voted to spend their tax money for light rail,” the lawsuit says.
King County Executive Ron Sims, who also is Sound Transit’s board chairman, said the lawsuit came as no surprise. He said he was confident Sound Transit’s moves during the past year comply with the law and characterized the suit as a bid to complicate the agency’s quest for federal money.
The Sound Move regional transit plan approved by voters six years ago called for a 21-mile light-rail line from Seattle’s University District to SeaTac. But Sound Transit acknowledged 17 months ago that the project was $1 billion over budget and three years behind schedule.
Last fall the agency’s board voted to go ahead with part of that project, a 14-mile segment from downtown Seattle to Tukwila, while continuing to examine new routes and seek money to reach the U District and SeaTac.
Construction of the initial segment is scheduled to begin this year.
In February, Sane Transit urged Sound Transit to seek a pre-emptive court ruling clarifying the shorter line’s legality before selling bonds to finance the line. The opposition group argued a bond default could result if Sound Transit went ahead with construction now and the project was ruled illegal later.
Sound Transit declined that invitation to take itself to court but didn’t respond in writing to Sane Transit’s demand until this week.
Sane Transit also asked the state Attorney General’s Office to move to block Sound Transit from spending tax dollars on the scaled-back project. But state Solicitor General Narda Pierce declined last month, acknowledging “a legitimate basis for differing views” but finding no clear violation of the law.
In their lawsuit, Sane Transit and Baerwaldt argue that state law requires that a voter-approved project be built “in substantially the same form as approved by voters.” Sound Transit has “abandoned” its original proposal, the opponents contend.
Sound Transit says that’s not so. In a letter to Sane Transit’s lawyer dated Thursday, Sound Transit general counsel Desmond Brown argues the agency is building the 21-mile line in phases, an approach he says the law and Sound Move allow.
The new complaint is the third lawsuit foes have filed to block light rail. The other two are in federal court.
A group called Citizens for Mobility filed one in 2000, contending Sound Transit’s original project violated environmental laws. That suit is on hold while Sound Transit revises plans.
The second lawsuit, filed by Save Our Valley, a Rainier Valley group, contends Sound Transit violated civil-rights laws by deciding to build light rail through the valley on the surface rather than underground, disproportionately harming minority and low-income residents.
U.S. District Judge Barbara Rothstein dismissed that claim last year, but Save Our Valley, with support from national civil-rights groups, has appealed.
SLC Mayor Touts Transit To Skeptical Davis Crowd
Saturday, May 18, 2002
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
FARMINGTON — Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson, dressed head to toe in cowboy garb and toting a computerized slide show, told Davis County business executives that his city wants Davis visitors — but not their cars.
Those comments came during Anderson’s much ballyhooed speech before a Chamber of Commerce audience furious with his opposition to Legacy Highway through south Davis County.
The mayor has been the focal point of Davis County residents’ wrath ever since he became part of a lawsuit to overturn the Legacy project, which locals believe will ease their traffic-jammed commutes through the narrow south Davis corridor.
That lawsuit resulted in a federal appeals court stop-work order in November that halted the $451 million highway from Farmington to North Salt Lake in its tracks. The state is paying more than $100,000 a day above that budget in contractor suspension costs while waiting for a court ruling.
Instead of building Legacy, which he described as an “absolutely reckless decision” and a “horrible disservice to the public,” Anderson prefers a “transit-first” approach over building more superhighways.
Expanded transit would bring Davis residents into Utah’s capital city on buses and trains rather than in their cars, which Anderson says push already taxed air-quality limits and create long-term health hazards.
“No city has ever escaped traffic woes by building more highways,” the mayor told his polite but skeptical audience on Thursday.
That said, Anderson added that he believes a highway alternative to Interstate 15 can and should be built — but not of the scope of the proposed Legacy.
“Where?” “Where?” shouted members of the normally quiet audience. Anderson did not propose a specific route, but said he believes options exist farther east of the south end of Legacy’s 14-mile corridor.
Businessman Sheldon Killpack asked Anderson to explain the contradiction between wanting no more roads in traffic-squeezed Davis County, while at the same time promoting construction of more car-hungry parking lots in Salt Lake City.
And why, Killpack asked, doesn’t the mayor oppose the permanent expansion of Interstate 215 in the Salt Lake Valley from two to four lanes?
Anderson said his city is in a transitory phase between past automobile dependence and a future with expanded transit options. More parking is needed, he said, to keep downtown businesses viable while that transition is taking place.
And, he said, his administration has yet to form a position regarding the permanent expansion of lanes along I-215.
The answers did not satisfy one of Anderson’s loudest critics, Layton Councilman Stuart Adams.
“He skirted the question,” Adams said after the speech.
“It is OK to increase automobile traffic in Salt Lake City because they vote for him,” the councilman said. “He is not consistent and he is self-serving. That said, I’d like to thank him for coming. He’s a great guy, but he won no converts here.”
(NOTE: several responses to this article followed)
Sabotage: Rail Firm’s Crash Theory
Guardian
Saturday May 18, 2002
The rail maintenance firm Jarvis yesterday claimed that a sophisticated saboteur with “informed” engineering knowledge may have deliberately tampered with points to cause last week’s fatal train crash at Potters Bar.
The company, which is responsible for the upkeep of the line, produced a dossier of information to back up its theory. Jarvis revealed that it was combing its records in search of disgruntled former employees who could be responsible.
But Jarvis’s assertions triggered a sceptical reaction from some investigators, who said they still considered maintenance failures a more likely explanation.
Rail industry sources said Jarvis was desperate to shift the blame away from its staff. Railtrack revealed it had ordered checks for similar problems on points across the network.
Jarvis said the derailment of Friday’s WAGN service from London to King’s Lynn was caused by three different faults with a set of points.
Two sets of nuts were missing and a further nut was too tight, pulling the track out of position.
Kevin Hyde, the company’s chief operating officer, said: “These are three acts of commission—three things done deliberately.”
He said they were carried out by an “informed” individual: “To have the biggest impact on trains moving through the points, this is probably the most dangerous set of changes which could take place. For that to be random would be difficult to imagine.”
Jarvis said there was easy access to the points from a nearby gate into an office car park.
The company said sabotage was not unknown on the railways, and listed six instances in eight years of deliberate tampering with equipment.
Among those, it said, points had been tampered with in Darlington, Knottingley, Yorkshire, and Haringey, north London, in the four years preceeding Friday’s crash, which killed seven people and injured more than 40.
Mr Hyde said: “There are some very strange people who do strange things on the railways.”
It emerged yesterday that two men working for a rail contractor were arrested and bailed on May 1 after causing explosions further up the line near Stevenage, Hertfordshire. Armed British Transport police were called in when the men were found blowing up aerosols.
A three-man team from Jarvis inspected the Potters Bar points on May 1. They found two nuts missing from the front stretcher bar on the points and insist they immediately replaced them.
Mr Hyde said Jarvis believed this could have been an earlier, simpler, attempt at sabotage: “I’ve spoken to engineers who’ve worked for decades in the railway industry and they’ve never seen a situation where nuts have come off as part of the normal operation of points.”
The day before the accident, a two-man Jarvis team walked the line and kicked the points to check that stretcher bars were intact.
A worker resting on the platform at Potters Bar station vouched that he had seen them do this.
Immediately after the accident, investigators found four detached nuts lying alongside the points. But instead of falling into a metal basket beneath the points, the nuts were lying in ballast nearby. Mr Hyde said they could not have naturally fallen into this position: “These nuts did not just vibrate off: they’ve been taken off and left in the ballast.”
A further nut appeared to have been tightened, closing the gap between two tracks to squeeze the wheels of trains passing overhead.
Photographs from the scene show that the thread on the bar beneath the nut was shiny, which a Jarvis metallurgist claimed meant it must have been moved within 24 hours of the accident.
Mr Hyde said there was enough information to interpret the crash as a “deliberate act of sabotaging equipment”. He said this “ought to be something which required further investigation”.
He claimed the nuts could have been moved by anyone with an 18-inch spanner avail able at hardware shops. This contradicted the view of the chief inspector of railways, Allen Sefton, who said on Tuesday that an “ordinary DIY-er” could not have done the job.
British Transport police said they were aware of Jarvis’s theory. A spokesman said the company had based its claims on photographs of the crash scene which were “secondary evidence”, while investigators had access to “primary evidence” at the scene itself.
Rail industry sources continued to point the finger at poor maintenance, insisting most vandals have little imagination beyond throwing obstructions in front of trains.
Railtrack, having already checked more than 800 points across the network, has ordered its staff to examine a further 2,000.
(NOTE: this is a serious issue concerning a region’s long term economic prosperity. Besides which, a strong center city is good for rail transit)
Cities Seeking to Lure Suburbanites; Los Angeles Plan to Rebuild Downtown Aimed at Young Professionals
The Times Union (Albany, NY)
05/19/2002
Chicago Tribune: The city that helped the nation define urban sprawl has approved a plan to redevelop downtown Los Angeles and, officials hope, attract thousands of people back to the heart of the city so many fled for suburbia.
The City Council voted last week to spend $2.4 billion to revamp the blighted core of downtown and eventually build about 13,000 housing units that would include low-income housing as well as more luxurious apartment complexes.
The trend is growing across the country.
“In almost every major city we are beginning to see this happen,” said Paul Jacob, vice chairman of RTKL, one of the world’s largest architecture and design companies. “It is the reverse of sprawl.”
One of the groups that developers think will be attracted to the new urban center is young professionals who grew up amid the manicured lawns and back-yard pools of the quintessential California suburb — the San Fernando Valley.
“What they are attracted to is that this is the antithesis of suburbia,” Jacob said.
The projected future center of the nation’s second-largest city also will include more offices, shops, grocery stores, movie theaters and other entertainment venues, allowing people to live and work in the center of town. Some could even abandon automobiles.
“For Los Angeles, that is quite a breakthrough,” said Jacob, who is working on part of the redevelopment close to the multiuse Staples Center, home of the Los Angeles Lakers and frequently a concert venue.
As the city’s population has grown to 3.6 million people, housing, particularly for middle- and lower-income families, has become scarcer. People spend more time commuting, but for many that has reached its limit.
“L.A. was built around a mass transit system called the car,” said Maura O’Connor, a real estate lawyer in Los Angeles. “We are realizing the limits to that system now.”
In addition to the downtown reconstruction, there has been progress in building light rail lines and a subway system with connections to Union Station downtown.
Separate from the new plans for downtown, two other major projects are expected to add vibrancy to central Los Angeles. Just on the edge of the decaying center, the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels is nearing completion. Nearby is the Disney Hall, a concert venue that is scheduled to open next year.
The Staples Center project was partly responsible for the broader development plan for the area. To get permission to build the center, just south of downtown, developers had to promise to come up with a detailed vision for the area immediately around the complex.
The City Council has now taken the first step toward an even bigger overhaul for an area that has been in decline for decades.
As new freeways and suburbs lured businesses and residents away from the core of the city and as high-end commercial real estate was developed close to the old center, the traditional heart of the city turned into a Skid Row featuring deserted buildings, drug dealers and homeless people.
As part of the council-approved plan, about $150 million would be provided over 30 years to help the homeless in the old downtown.
Like so many other plans to limit sprawl and redevelop urban areas, this one is not without conflict. Some say the gentrification will come at the expense of the poor, and others criticize attempts by wealthy business people to bring a professional football team back to the city.
While that is not included in the plan, Colorado entrepreneur Philip Anschutz said he plans to build a 64,000-seat football stadium in the center of Los Angeles that could become the new home of the San Diego Chargers or another National Football League team. He said investors would spend up to $ 450 million of private money to build the stadium at no cost to taxpayers.
Some developers are skeptical in part because downtown is distant from the thing that most often drives upscale development — the Pacific Ocean.
“There are no natural resources downtown,” said Paul Jennings, chief executive officer of PCS Development.
Jennings said he doubts that downtown would be attractive to wealthier individuals. He said those who could afford expensive housing would be attracted to coastal areas and predicted the new downtown would be more of a middle-class community that would also attract former suburban young people looking for a more bohemian, urban experience.
While demographics have convinced developers that Los Angeles is ready for a return to urban living, other factors have to be considered.
“For young parents there will be the question of schools,” said lawyer O’Connor, who added that she would love to live downtown if not for her young child.
And then there is the city’s culture.
“There is this culture of the back yard,” O’Connor said. “If you live in Manhattan, the child plays in the apartment, or you take them to the park. Not so in L.A.”
Plain Inglish ; When UTA Director Isn’t Arranging a Ride, He’s A-riding a Range; Inglish Makes TRAX, But Has Roots
The Salt Lake Tribune
05/19/2002
Take a peek into a particular barn in Draper and you might spot a guy in boots and a button-down shirt pitching hay. That would be right after the 4-in-the-morning Hopalong Cassidy show, and right before he sits at the general manager’s desk at the Utah Transit Authority.
Meet John Inglish, who runs a $120 million quasi-public department that puts 104,000 people a day on buses and trains — and who needs a secretary and a Palm Pilot to get him to appointments, sometimes snoozes when parties are in full swing and prefers horses to horsepower.
Simply put, the $225,000-a-year transit czar is an insomniac, scatterbrained, party-pooping cowboy who by many accounts is doing a terrific job.
“You got to go with who and what you are,” Inglish shrugs.
Many supporters say Utah got a bargain in Inglish, 56, who in his five years at the helm:
Secured $250 million in federal funds for the $312.5 million TRAX light-rail line from Sandy to Salt Lake City and finished the job under budget and a year ahead of schedule.
Acquired $94.8 million in federal money to build the $118.5 million University Line, again under budget and ahead of schedule.
Negotiated the largest-ever land acquisition — 175 miles of Union Pacific rail corridor — by a U.S. transit agency.
Presided over an Olympic transportation system that garnered rave reviews nationally.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta recently hailed Inglish at a national American Public Transportation Association conference for the role UTA played in the success of the 2002 Winter Olympics. Highly respected throughout the transportation industry, Inglish chairs several national transit initiatives and is on a first-name basis with many members of Congress and key congressional and White House staffers.
Even so, he is hardly a household name in Utah, despite the fact he oversees 1,800 workers, 585 buses, 33 TRAX cars and 140 vans.
So who is John Inglish?
By all accounts, he is a paradox — an innovator exploring transit’s future even as he pines for an American West that is long past.
For instance, Inglish and his cadre of engineers pioneered the “connection protection,” a computerized text messaging system that tells bus drivers to linger at train stations when TRAX is running late so passengers don’t miss their bus connections.
They installed automated passenger counting systems on buses, enabling UTA to put buses and routes where they are needed most. And with a $1.5 million federal grant, they are developing wireless technology that will allow freight and passenger trains to safely operate simultaneously on the same rail corridor.
“John is a technology adapter,” says Richard Hodges, UTA Intelligent Transportation System project manager. “He gives us enough rope to either make a rope ladder or hang ourselves.”
But during his rare off time, Inglish shoes horses, does leatherwork, makes saddles and immerses himself in Western memorabilia. Every July, he spends a week in the saddle helping a friend in Salina herd sheep. On weekends, he likes to ride one of his nine horses in the foothills and canyons, alone now that his children are on their own and his youngest son, a rodeo champion, is serving a Mormon mission. His wife, Carole, is a reluctant rider and ranch hand.
An insomniac since he and his UTA predecessor, John Pingree, found themselves on the business end of a lawsuit 10 years ago — “I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep since,” he says — Inglish nods off each night about 9:30.
“He gets up during the night to watch old Hopalong Cassidy shows on the cowboy channel,” Carole Inglish says. “He even has (Hopalong’s) laugh down. In fact, he has a Hopalong Cassidy lunchbox.”
Inglish is equally enthused about his paint “reining” horse, trained to work to a rider’s leg and body movements. After getting the horse back from a trainer in Sevier County, Inglish realized he had more horse than sense about how to ride it.
“So I call the trainer and ask him, ‘What’s with the horse?’” Inglish says. “He says, ‘You need to come down here and I’ll train you how to ride the horse.’”
Inglish would love to ride the horse in competition, but laments that his 13-hour work days leave him no time.
New Kid in Town: Inglish’s love of horses may be a matter of geography. He was born May 24, 1945, in Phoenix to Erma and Carl Inglish, a Southern Pacific Railroad engineer whose work took the family from California to small outposts in Oregon, Arizona and Texas.
Inglish recalls living on a railroad siding at the edge of a bear-infested forest near Bend, Ore., and attending first and second grades in a two-room schoolhouse. His friends on carp-fishing forays as a fourth-grader in Gila Bend, Ariz., were mostly sectionhand kids. Other whistlestops included Tucson, Ariz.; El Paso, Texas; and Novato, Calif.
“I was always the new kid in town,” Inglish says. “It made me a little outgoing and unafraid to try new situations. But it was frustrating because you didn’t have any connections and it was hard to get summer jobs.”
An avid outdoorsman and adventurer, Inglish chafed at his parents’ city ways. His father, “an engineer’s engineer,” liked to tinker with electronic gadgets indoors. His mother, who grew up on a ranch, had had enough of the great outdoors.
“I was always wanting to go fishing and they weren’t inclined,” Inglish says.
Fortunately, he spent summers at his grandfather’s Arizona spread, riding, roping and branding. Later, he made his mark as the Navato High School senior class president who staged a dance party aboard a four-decker ship in San Francisco Bay.
Settling Down, Moving Up: Inglish met Carole during his freshman year at Brigham Young University, and they married after he returned from a Mormon mission to Brazil. She worked to put him through engineering school.
Inglish’s prenuptial warning? “ ‘I hope you are not too fond of Salt Lake City, because I plan to travel,’” his wife recalls. “ Now I can’t get him to move. He’s the one who has put down roots.”
The Inglishes did travel, though, when Carole took a job as an airlines reservationist. The couple and their four children did a lot of seat-of-the-pants travel in Europe, Asia or South America with a suitcase, no reservations and little advance planning.
Inglish began his career in 1970 with the Utah Highway Department. After earning his master’s degree at the University of Utah, he took a job as transportation director for the Wasatch Front Regional Council. As a Carnegie Mellon fellow in 1975, he studied European transit systems. He joined UTA in 1976 as a planning and marketing director, became director of operations in 1980 and assistant general manager seven years later.
It was as Pingree’s assistant that Inglish experienced his darkest days. After a failed 1992 light-rail tax referendum, Pingree and UTA pressed ahead with buying the right of way for what is now the Sandy-Salt Lake City TRAX line. Even though the $18 million purchase would prove to be a bargain, an anti-light-rail group sued Pingree, Inglish and UTA’s director of operations for racketeering.
A judge ultimately threw the case out of court, and in 1997, UTA’s board booted Pingree and selected Inglish to replace him.
“When I walked out the door, I took a lot of enemies with me,” Pingree says. “I was kind of a lightning rod. So my leaving left UTA with a clean slate and helped John make a fresh start.”
Roadrunner: As he always had, Inglish hit the ground running.
“We call him the Roadrunner because he’s always on the go,” says his secretary, Carol Brophy, who helps plot his schedule and tracks his every move.
It’s no easy task. Inglish acknowledges he is easily sidetracked.
“I tend to get too many things going on and try to do too much,” he says. “If I pick up an item in one room and try to put it away in another, I never make it. I’ll find five more things to distract me. It drives my wife crazy.”
A typical Inglish day may include feeding his horses and yellow Labradors, attending meetings and hobnobbing with legislators, swapping stories with workers and chatting with industry colleagues.
A problem solver by nature, Inglish seldom is able to resist meddling with machinery. Riding TRAX a few weeks ago, he fixed a heating and ventilation unit.
When he is not in Utah, Inglish may be in Washington, D.C., to keep federal dollars flowing home. He may have to look up bus and train times in Utah, but he has memorized plane and train schedules that get him to the nation’s capital.
There, he is known as a consummate horse trader, quick to cede a few dollars for one project to gain even more for another. He seems equally adept at making friends in Utah — even with UTA’s critics.
Orem Mayor Jerry Washburn, for example, is disappointed with the lack of passengers on UTA buses in his community, but believes Inglish is capable of boosting the numbers.
West Valley City Mayor Gearld Wright says Inglish is a straight shooter. “He’s very amiable and you can bank on what he tells you,” Wright says.
The Drawing Board: With Inglish at UTA’s helm, TRAX’s main Salt Lake City-to-Sandy line debuted in December 1999.
Eleven months later, voters in Salt Lake, Davis and Weber counties said yes to a quarter-cent sales tax hike to expand light rail and bus service. The vote puts another $43 million in UTA coffers each year.
Since then, UTA has built the University Line, which it will extend to the University of Utah Medical Center by 2004 at a cost of roughly $89 million. UTA also spent $185 million to purchase the right of way for a commuter rail line that one day will stretch from Brigham City to Payson.
The agency now is negotiating to buy 25 used light-rail cars from San Jose, Calif. Plans to double bus service within five years, though, may be curtailed because of a weak economy.
There is plenty more — $13 billion worth over 30 years — on the drawing boards. Included in that total is an estimated $525 million for two TRAX spurs, one to West Valley City and another to West Jordan/South Jordan. Much of the $13 billion is earmarked for commuter rail. Later projects probably will include light-rail spurs to Salt Lake City International Airport and Draper.
A more immediate challenge is to reduce costs for Flextrans, the bus service that serves people with disabilities but costs UTA more than $24 per trip. Inglish also might set up day-care centers to attract more women into UTA’s ranks.
And before he retires in 10 years or so, Inglish wants to see fast and efficient buses and trains full of passengers crisscrossing the valleys of the Wasatch Front.
Count on it, says Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson.
“Utah in 20 years will have a major commuter rail system, greatly expanded bus service, a light rail system connected to intermodal hubs,” the mayor predicts. “And we’ll have John to thank for most of it.”
On The Subway Deal Express Bids Are Still Out, But Transit Boss Was Kawasaki’s Guest
New York Daily News
05/19/2002
At a time when New York is evaluating bids for the largest subway-car contract in its history, the executive who oversees the city subway system was a guest at a dedication for bidder Kawasaki’s Nebraska assembly plant and provided an enthusiastic endorsement for the company’s trains.
Among his activities on behalf of the Japan-based company, New York City Transit Senior Vice President Joseph Hofmann gave a speech at the plant on April 19 in which he lauded Kawasaki’s commitment to quality, and said the city is eager for more of its “good (subway) cars.”
Kawasaki promotional literature distributed at the event quoted Hofmann, including statements that the company’s subway cars “don’t break down” and that they “last a long time and they’re easy to maintain.”
“Kawasaki always gives us a good product,” Hofmann says in the company’s glossy brochure, which also features photos of its subway cars and is imprinted with the logos of the New York City Transit Authority and its parent, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
The transit agency called the trip routine but released a letter in which the agency’s top lawyer called Kawasaki’s use of statements attributed to Hofmann and the company’s use of MTA logos “unauthorized and impermissible.”
According to the May 10 letter from Martin Schnabel, transit general counsel, the company has agreed to stop distributing the materials.
But the timing of Hofmann’s trip—in the midst of a contract deal—was criticized as inappropriate by one transit advocate.
“The timing of this is ill-advised,” said Gene Russianoff, a senior lawyer for the Straphangers Campaign, an advocacy group that is part of the New York Public Interest Research Group.
“If you are in the heat of reviewing proposals from companies, the message you want to send is it’s an even playing field. The appearance isn’t great.”
Kawasaki is competing against two other foreign conglomerates—Bombardier of Canada and Alstom of France—to build 660 New York subway cars, with options to make as many as 1,040 more over the next decade. The deal could eventually be worth $3 billion.
The relationship between Hofmann and Kawasaki also could raise questions under state ethics rules designed to safeguard the impartiality of purchasing decisions and maintain an ethical firewall between city employees and the vendors with whom they do business. Clear ethics rules Ethics guidelines require employees to avoid conduct that leaves even an impression that “any person can improperly influence him or unduly enjoy his favor” in city business dealings. The guidelines direct employees not to engage in conduct that suggests they can be influenced “by any party or person.”
Hofmann was a member of MTA executive committees in 1997 and 1998 that recommended the awarding of lucrative subway car contracts to Kawasaki. The 1997 deal was eventually divided between Kawasaki and Bombardier.
An executive committee has not yet been named for the pending contract, MTA spokesman Thomas Kelly said. He could not say if Hofmann would be a member.
Hofmann could not be reached for comment.
Staff at the Transit Authority has been reviewing the proposals, and the winning bidder or bidders will eventually be chosen by the MTA board.
Transit Authority spokesman Charles Seaton said Hofmann’s trip was within the scope of his duties and approved by TA President Lawrence Reuter.
Hofmann “was attending the ceremony and inspecting the car bodies,” Seaton said.
Seaton could not say if Hofmann was entertained by Kawasaki executives during the two-day trip. He noted Hofmann filed expenses for $40 for meals. The city paid the airfare and hotel bill.
According to reports in Nebraska media, the ceremony at the Kawasaki plant included a mockup of Grand Central Terminal, with a recording of Frank Sinatra crooning over the audio system. The plant is assembling subway cars for New York City under a previous contract. Web of connections The intense competition for the pending contract has resulted in a web of backstage political connections.
Each of the companies seeking the subway contract has hired wired-in advisers with strong ties to Gov. Pataki, who appoints or signs off on MTA board members, its chairman and executive director.
Alstom has hired former Sen. Al D’Amato, Pataki’s political patron. Bombardier is being advised by Pataki’s former law partner, William Plunkett. Kawasaki is working with former state GOP chairman William Powers, who helped steer Pataki’s 1994 and 1998 campaigns.
A former top aide to D’Amato, Richard Nasti, resigned from his position at the MTA after the Daily News revealed his behind-the-scenes involvement in the pending contract and a job arrangement that ran afoul of the state Ethics Commission.
Nasti, who was working for months as an off-the-books aide to MTA Chairman Peter Kalikow, met privately with representatives of each company even though he had no official role in the closely guarded bidding process.
Kawasaki Vice President Hiroji Iwasaki declined to answer questions about Hofmann’s visit. “It’s in the process of the bid,” he said.
Alstom and Bombardier did not respond to questions.
35 Years On The Go
The Toronto Sun
05/19/2002
It was exactly 35 years ago this coming Thursday that GO Transit, described in newspaper reports of May 23, 1967 as “the nation’s first specially designed rail commuter service,” began operations. The first service provided by the new GO project on that day was along the 95 km Lakeshore route between Hamilton on the west and Pickering on the east. Officiating were the provincial premier-of-the-day John Robarts accompanied by his highways Minister George Gomme and CNR vice-president D.V. Gonder. The first eastbound train left the Oakville station at 5:50 a.m., the first westbound from Pickering at 6 a.m.
Interestingly, the concept of a transportation system that would provide access to and from Toronto for people living outside its borders had been pioneered almost a century earlier. These lines began as privately-financed routes using high-speed electric trains serving communities such as Port Credit, Georgetown and Guelph to the west, Woodbridge, Richmond Hill, Newmarket and even Sutton to the north.
‘Radials’
And while plans had been initiated to connect Toronto with communities east of the city (Oshawa, Port Perry, Lindsay and Peterborough), and in a few cases the physical rights-of-way purchased, these eastern routes never materialized.
Collectively, the lines were known as “radials,” a term penned by Sir Adam Beck, creator and first chairman of Ontario Hydro, the word being descriptive of the way the lines radiated out from Toronto.
While politics were to eventually doom Beck’s radials, there’s little doubt that the main culprit was the proliferation of cars and trucks. These vehicles prompted the construction of miles of new highways. Government money was tight and soon the radials were being ignored. Beck’s dream eventually died.
As the years passed, an ever-increasing number of cars and trucks began to overwhelm much of the province’s highway system. The subject of an inter-city rail commuter system again became a popular topic. For a time, both the CNR and CPR got into the commuter rail business, eventually “pooling” their services. However, the fact that there was more money in carrying freight than there was in carrying people put an end to that idea. Now the pressure was on the provincial government to do something.
The birth of the present GO Transit operation can be traced back to 1963 when the province initiated a study to determine what existing facilities might be acceptable for use as commuter train corridors. That study revealed that of the 463 km of track throughout the metropolitan Toronto region, approximately 90% or 400 km could be adapted to commuter train use that would involve one or two trains daily in each direction. Of that figure, 130 or so km were located between the communities of Burlington and Pickering and centred on Toronto.
Two years later, a survey was conducted among the people living in the Burlington-Pickering corridor to see if they would use a commuter service if one was to be established. The survey revealed that approximately 90,000 people drove their cars in an east-west direction when going to work each day. Of that number nearly half were headed into Toronto.
Surveying this latter group, nearly 15,000 said they would use a commuter train service if one was available. That was good enough for the government and on May 17, 1965 Premier Robarts announced the creation of a rail commuter service for the Toronto area. It was to be a three-year experiment. And in spite of an American transit expert’s prediction GO would be a failure, by the end of its first full year in business GO had carried more than 4 million commuters (an average of 15,363 each working day) on its single Lakeshore route.
By comparison, GO Transit presently serves 165,000 commuters each working day and last year carried a total of 43 million passengers.
Bus Routes
To supplement its train service, GO Transit began introducing bus routes. In 1989 a few of those buses began loading and unloading near the busy Front and Bay St. intersection. Now, approximately 200 use the on-street terminal each work day. The congestion and resulting impact on schedules soon became intolerable. There was no doubt that a new bus terminal to serve Union Station was an absolute necessity.
Not that the idea of such a terminal was new. In fact, the billion dollar Metro Centre project of the early 1970s (that would have seen the demolition of most of Union Station) had made provisions for a new bus terminal. When that project died, so too did the new terminal. Things got so bad that in 1977 a Toronto newspaper ran an editorial pointing out the obvious, “Toronto needs a new bus terminal.” Again, nothing happened.
Finally, late last month, ground was broken for a new $3.1 million GO Transit bus terminal to be located between Yonge and Bay Sts. just south of the Federal Building. Buses will begin to use this new facility in July.
Jarvis Attacked For Rail Crash Sabotage Claim
Sunday The Observor, London
May 19, 2002
A bitter row has broken out over responsibility for the Potters Bar rail tragedy after the maintenance contractor, Jarvis, presented evidence for its claim that sabotage led to the crash.
Senior industry sources attacked Jarvis, arguing that faulty repairs were far more likely to have caused the points failure on 10 May that derailed the train, killing seven people.
Tony Thompson, who now coaches police officers in disaster management, having retired as a superintendent in March after 30 years with the British Transport Police, criticised Jarvis for trying to exonerate itself.
‘Their stance is very defensive and putting the blame on everyone else. It is appalling the lack of sympathy for what the bereaved and injured are going through.’
Thompson said that until the investigation was completed, Jarvis should be more open-minded rather than trying to ‘shore up its share price and reputation’.
Jarvis will almost certainly be sacked from its contract to maintain the east coast mainline if its workers are found to have made a mistake, sources close to the investigation told The Observer.
But it is understood that whatever the outcome of the investigation, Railtrack bosses want to take responsibility for engineering quality, track inspection and maintenance supervision away from all its contractors to ‘close a gap’ left by privatisation.
The source said: ‘We have to get greater control… we want to be in charge of the decision-making over what work is done. Privatisation envisaged that the contractors would do everything—have all the records and make all the decisions—and we do not think that is right.’
British Transport Police are still investigating the possibility that the badly-damaged points 2182 outside Potters Bar station were wrecked by a saboteur, most likely a disgruntled railway worker.
Police sources said they were examining a gate giving access to the tracks near the points and had collected closed-circuit television film from the adjacent office car park. But they added that if Jarvis’s stated belief—that someone deliberately tampered with the nuts and bolts on the points in a murderous act of foul play—was true, such an situation would be ‘unprecedented’.
Jarvis chief operating officer, Kevin Hyde, suggested on Friday that two pairs of nuts had been deliberately detached from the points, while other nuts had been over-tightened in ‘the most dangerous’ way in the 24 hours between Jarvis’s last inspection and the crash.
Hyde said the evidence collected by Jarvis about sabotage and the accounts given to him by ‘experienced’ employees about their track inspections were ‘robust’.
But police sources said they believed the points had been fatally misaligned ‘for some time’—implying that the Jarvis track worker who inspected them on 9 May may have failed to notice that they were jammed and some nuts were missing.
Industry experts will this week carry out tests on a duplicate set of points to see if they can replicate the sequence of events that led to the bars becoming so distorted that they snapped and caused the derailment.
Crash Sabotage Theory Trashed By Rail Experts
Independent on Sunday
19 May 2002
Rail industry experts yesterday discounted claims by the company responsible for maintaining the points at Potters Bar that sabotage was to blame.
The claims by Jarvis that metallurgists had found evidence that the points had been tampered with were dismissed by one industry expert as “stuff and nonsense”.
Jarvis’s chief operating officer, Ken Hyde, said a “silvery thread” had been discovered on one of the bolts, which had fallen off the points, triggering the crash. “Metal experts told us that was done 24 hours before the accident,” he said.
However, senior engineers close to the official investigation team have told the Independent on Sunday that Jarvis’s claims have little foundation. More than 100 trains had passed safely over the points in the 24 hours before the accident.
Many were high speed trains heading for the North- East and Scotland, as well as fast Home Counties trains, such as the 12.45 to King’s Lynn, which came off the rails. But 41 trains were slow suburban services, most of which were switched across the points into the northbound stopping platform with no problems.
The last train to be switched safely across across the points on the day of the accident was the 11.36 King’s Cross to Peterborough, which stopped at Potters Bar at 11.51. An indicator in the signal box at King’s Cross registered electronically that the points switched properly. Minutes later, the points switched incorrectly under the fourth carriage of the 11.45 from King’s Cross, leading to the death of seven people.
Experts said last night that this sequence of events was far more likely to indicate bad maintenance than sabotage, which would have derailed a train much sooner. A British Transport Police spokesman said that Jarvis had had access to only “secondary” photographic evidence, rather than the primary evidence under investigation.
Jarvis’s claims were also dismissed by the rail analyst Christian Wolmar. He said in an interview on BBC radio yesterday it was in the company’s interests, because of its falling share price, to identify factors other than maintenance as the cause. “It is a company flailing about,” Mr Wolmar said.
Mr Wolmar said his own sources suggested that the crash was ’down to some odd attempt at maintenance—it was a cockeyed bit of work. The points were out of alignment.”
British Transport Police also ruled out any connection between the arrest of two men on the rail line at Stevenage, some 20 miles down the line, and the crash.
The cross-party Commons select committee on transport is to put further pressure on Stephen Byers, the Transport Secretary, by warning that he is running out of money for improvements to the rail network.
The report on the Government’s 10-year transport plan will show that only about £5 billion is left of the £60 billion allocated to rail.
Transit, Profit Don’t Go Together
Toronto Star
05/20/2002
The transit system in Hong Kong makes money.
But it’s the only one in the world that does.
Nowhere else on Earth, and especially nowhere in North America, does transit attract enough passengers to pay for its enormous capital and operating costs—let alone turn a profit—from the fare box alone.
It’s not even close.
Typically, North American transit agencies rely on government subsidies to pay a good portion of their operating expenses—fuel, wages and the like—and for all of their capital requirements, in particular the costs of building a system.
What Hong Kong has, and what almost every other jurisdiction lacks, are the teeming population densities that place so many potential riders along every segment of its transit system so that its bus and rail routes almost always run at or above their optimum capacities.
York Region is no Hong Kong
The vast expanse of suburbia above Toronto is, in many ways, the polar opposite of the compact Chinese city. Replete with single-family home developments—and rural fields awaiting similar suburban fates—York Region is a prototypical transit waste-land.
Having neither the population densities nor the employment nodes that transit needs to thrive, York depends on cars for more than 85% of its passenger trips every day.
So the municipality’s idea of enlisting a private, profit-driven company to build and run a new rapid-transit system across the region seems a strange one at best.
First of all, there’s no apparent profit to be had. None, that is, unless taxpayers and passengers are enlisted to cover the same costs they would have for a purely public system.
If you add a profit margin on to those normal expenses—and no private company would get into such a venture unless a profit were guaranteed—the public will almost certainly be on the hook for that money, too.
It can be argued that private firms can add efficiencies into a system that the public sector cannot. But in the case of transit, the systems are so far from being profitable that any private-sector efficiencies, if they do exist, would be swamped by the onerous costs. And any notion that the system’s users alone should pay for better transit in the region through higher fares is counterproductive. If fares are too high, people won’t use the system.
Besides, the argument in favour of public funding of efficient transit is undeniable: providing transportation for people without cars, freeing up roadways for those who drive and for the movement of goods, and protecting the environment.
GO Transit managing director Gary McNeil has likened York Region’s private transit plans to obtaining a mortgage on a house.
With a mortgage, you do get a house, but over the term of the loan you end up paying far more for the property than its original sales price.
In the same way, the region’s chosen transit builder—known as York Consortium 2002—would likely lay out much of the money to build a system, but in the end the municipality will pay far more than it would have had it done the job on its own.
So why pay more?
In York Region’s case, the answer likely lies in the ideological bent of the provincial Conservative government, which has been tying prospective funding for cities to their ability to create private-public partnership schemes.
In their laudable attempt to create a rapid-transit system, York’s leaders are hoping Queen’s Park will reward this public-private venture with cash.
And with an estimated cost of between $2.4 billion and $4.1 billion over the next 30 years, York’s ambitious rapid-transit plans will never hit the rails without massive amounts of provincial money to fuel them.
Maintenance Shake-up At Railtrack
The Business
Monday, May 20, 2002
Though the changes will come far too late for those who died in the crash at Potters Bar on 1o May, Railtrack has been quietly planning to shake up its maintenance procedures for months.
The plans highlight the fact that the company has known for a long time that maintenance—and therefore safety—on Britain’s dilapidated railway network could improve.
This autumn, Railtrack will bring decision-making on its maintenance procedures back in-house.
While subcontractors such as Jarvis will continue to do the hands-on work, Railtrack will be in charge, receiving all the reports from inspectors and taking responsibility for analysing information so it can instruct contractors what to do and when and where to do it. It will then check that the work has been done properly.
The network operator will try out the new strategy in the Wessex franchise area but hopes to introduce it nationwide. “If we are going to carry the can, we should be making the decisions” said a spokesman.
The strategy came out of a maintenance review in the wake of the fatal Hatfield crash in October 2000. Railtrack paid the price for Hatfield. It admitted responsibility for the accident—caused by a broken rail—almost immediately. As a result it had to pay out £600 million in compensation and maintenance costs the following year.
The costs are unlikely to be as high this time. First indications are that the points problem which caused the Potters Bar crash is not endemic, unlike broken rails which caused several months of speed restrictions post-Hatfield to allow emergency repairs throughout the network.
An inspection of 800 points by the HSE last weekend found “only a handful” of loose nuts, the root of the Potters Bar disaster.
Railtrack may not have to shoulder full blame for the accident this time if the contractor, Jarvis, is at fault.
Railtrack is covered by insurance and can rely on an industry fund to compensate victims and their families. Train operators may not be so lucky. Insurers have refused to cover them for loss of business after Hatfield, if there are months of persistent disruption,
Maintenance companies are also the losers. Jarvis could lose its contract if it is found to be culpable; its shares have already nose-dived. That is one reason why Jarvis’s chief operating officer, Kevin Hyde was keen to push the theory in some newspapers at the weekend that the crash was a result of sabotage.
The City does not seem to have been put off investing in the rail industry. “The crash has not had much of a significant effect for the long-term view. The appetite for investing in the rail industry is still there” says Charles Lloyd of PwC.
The process of brining Railtrack out of administration is also unaffected.
The rail industry, however, looks like it is heading for a major overhaul. Potters Bar has all the makings of being caused by human error and the only way to get rid of this is to take people out of the equation. Technological developments, such as track sensors and image recognition equipment, may make this possible. AEA Technology Rail is at the forefront of work in this field.
Unfortunately, above a combined speed of 60-70 mph the energies to be absorbed are so high that it defeats all of the know techniques, but if the vehicle body stays intact, as at Potters Bar, then folk inside still have a good chance of survival The fatalities were largely people who were ejected.
“In the light of history, I think we will look at Potters Bar as one of a series of fairly infrequent events, at higher speed than we are used to, but where the system protected the passenger quite well” says one expert.
Rail Contractor’s Sabotage Theory Criticised
The Guardian Monday
May 20, 2002
The train drivers’ leader Mick Rix last night accused the rail contractor Jarvis of “jumping the gun” by claiming sabotage might have caused the fatal Potters Bar crash.
The Aslef general secretary said the company should have presented any evidence to an industry inquiry on Tuesday next week instead of going public so soon.
Two experienced railway maintenance workers speaking to the Guardian also questioned the sabotage theory. Instead they painted a picture of a maintenance system critically short of experienced staff where standards have slipped to such an extent it can no longer guarantee safety.
Jarvis, said Mr Rix, appeared to be anxious to avoid any blame in an attempt to stave off potential compensation claims worth tens of millions of pounds. “I have seen no serious evidence to sustain the sabotage theory which is probably being advanced for commercial reasons.”
The union leader said the fragmented structure of the privatised rail industry meant Railtrack, train operating companies, injured passengers and the families of the seven people killed could all make claims against Jarvis if it was found to be negligent.
The contractor would also risk losing the maintenance contract and a huge question mark would be placed next to the government’s plan to part-privatise London Underground, because Jarvis is part of one of the consortiums awarded a contract to maintain stations and lines.
The transport secretary, Stephen Byers, will face calls to end contracting by Railtrack when he speaks to Aslef’s annual conference in Scarborough today. “Everyone in the industry knows the contracting culture does not work and we need the political will to do something about it,” said Mr Rix.
The maintenance workers speaking to the Guardian also said the problem lay with the contractors. “I have no idea what happened at Potters Bar but it seems to me the idea of sabotage is people just trying to cover their own backs,” said Terry, who was unwilling to allow his full name to be used because he said he would face the sack. “The fact that all maintenance work is sub-contracted out to all these different companies all trying to do the job as cheaply and quickly as possible is the real problem. We need to get back to where one body takes charge of the whole operation before we can sort this mess out.”
Terry, who has worked on the railways for more than 20 years, said it was possible to get the same certificates of competence that he has built up over that time by enrolling on a two-day course.
He said the contract agencies used by Railtrack to maintain the system keep a minimum of experienced workers on the payroll, preferring instead to bring in casual labour when they have a lot of work. As a result, he said, thousands of experienced maintenance workers had left the industry since the mid-1990s. He claimed that on a recent job only seven or eight of the 60 men required to replace a section of track had long term experience.
“I don’t [want] to be mean but most of them [the casual workers] just looked at you as if you were daft. We run around like blue-arsed flies but there is only so much that us experienced ones could do. You can’t check everything.
“It has got to the stage where there is a crisis of confidence among the workforce because they cannot do the job they are being asked to do.” Another railway worker, Jack, said the way maintenance teams operated was also having an effect on safety. He said that in the past he would have spent part of the week walking a stretch of track looking for faults and the other half working with a team to repair the problems.
But now those who look for faults and those who repair them work separately. “It means things get missed more easily compared to before and that jobs don’t always get done when they should.”
Train services are due to be resumed through Potters Bar today.
Letter: We Need More Room For Public Transport
Birmingham Post
05/20/2002
Sir,—If we are going to solve the transport problems of our towns and cities we are going to have to make public transport faster and more reliable than the car.
The simplest way is to give over road space from the car to bus or Metro.
Unfortunately councils have been scared of this idea, and it has become sacrosanct that you can’t possibly disadvantage car drivers. The schizophrenia that follows could wreck our cities with major new infrastructure ploughed through our most beautiful districts to avoid any disturbance to the car driver.
Hagley Road is a microcosm of this situation. Why do people want to live in areas like Harborne, Edgbaston and the like? Because they’re full of character and quirks. It’s no good building a transport system that is ultra-efficient but makes our city unfit to live in. All that will happen is that anyone with money will leave.
The sad truth is that as long as our cities are built around the one-man commuter in his one-man car with nothing being allowed to interfere with him, we will all be the poorer for it. JONATHAN MACE Walsall.
Syndicate Loan Facilitates Guangzhou Subway Project
XINHUA ECONOMIC NEWS SERVICE
05/20/2002
The No. 3 subway line project in Guangzhou, capital of south China’s Guangdong province, has been granted 6.5 billion yuan in loans from a banking syndicate.
An agreement was signed on May 18 between the Guangzhou Subway Company and a banking syndicate comprising nine banks.
The nine banks include the country’s four biggest State-owned banks, the Bank of Commerce and Industry of China, Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of China and Construction Bank of China.
Experts say this is the first time that such a large number of banks have been involved in a single project.
The subway project will serve as a major hub for Guangzhou municipality linking the southern and northern parts of the city.
Transit Line Seen As Vital To Future Of Meadowlands
The Record (Bergen County, NJ)
05/21/2002
It makes sense, say lawmakers, planners, and the public.
Use trains to bring people to the Meadowlands Sports Complex. Or to a Meadowlands convention center. Or to a Meadowlands shopping mall.
What isn’t clear—aside from the future of the Meadowlands—is how to get rail lines to the complex. Furthermore, there is uncertainty about what type of trains to use—light rail, commuter, or both?
“We have to now agree in concept that mass transit is critical to the Meadowlands Sports Complex, whatever may come of it,” said Assemblyman Paul Sarlo, D-Wood-Ridge. “It will be a home run for the Meadowlands complex.”
With the specter of a sports complex that may have three fewer teams in a couple years (the Nets and Devils want to flee to Newark, the Jets to Manhattan), rail options are being formed to serve whatever might rise in the place of Continental Arena.
Some options are a shopping mall, a convention center, or a mixture of both that also includes entertainment options, such as indoor kayaking.
That change would pump more traffic to the site on the already clogged New Jersey Turnpike and Routes 17, 3, and 120.
There are a few different commuter rail options on the table, along with a move to bring the Hudson Bergen Light Rail to the site.
No decision has been reached on how to extend light rail in Bergen County beyond the Vince Lombardi Rest Area on the turnpike. From there, a spur could run to the Meadowlands.
Most agree that the fastest way to get rail to the Meadowlands is from an existing commuter or heavy rail line.
Assemblywoman Rose Marie Heck, R-Hasbrouck Heights, favors realigning Route 120 and bringing in a commuter rail line.
“The most economical and fastest way into the Meadowlands with public transportation,” she said, “is to take that heavy rail, the Pascack Valley Line, into the Meadowlands.”
That approach would provide riders from Trenton, the shore, or Mahwah with access to the complex. A spur would be built from the existing line, giving Bergen County riders a no-transfer trip. Riders from the south would switch at the Secaucus Transfer station, expected to be operational by next year.
Heck said a proposed arena in downtown Newark for the Devils and the Nets would face a new set of transportation problems. Even though Penn Station is a few blocks from the would-be arena, getting there by car would mean a trip on already congested highways and city streets.
“Route 21 will be a horror story,” she said.
Heck added that she will not support any new proposal for the Meadowlands that is not accompanied by a rail plan.
Governor McGreevey is lobbying for a Newark arena and a redefined Meadowlands. McGreevey administration officials, however, declined to comment for this story. NJ Transit officials did not return repeated calls over several days seeking comment.
Another push is to create a commuter rail line through Bergen County that would also feed the Meadowlands.
The line would use the same “right of way” as existing freight tracks known as the West Shore line, owned and operated by CSX Transportation.
“The West Shore line is a very desirable project,” said Jeffery Zupan, director of the Regional Plan Association, which studies mass transit. “The reason it is desirable is that Rockland County and the eastern portions of Bergen County are among the poorest served corridors.”
Zupan would like to see the line, which runs north through Teaneck to the state line and beyond, because it would not just serve the Meadowlands, but would also connect to the Secaucus Transfer, thereby providing rail to a whole new section of the state.
The line, as Zupan envisions it, would connect with the Bergen County line after passing through the sports complex. It would continue to the transfer station.
But there are some obstacles to this design.
Because CSX heavily uses that right of way, new tracks would likely have to be laid. And the bistate component means more agencies would be involved, and therefore, more bureaucracy.
Still, Zupan says the fight and the expense is worth it, because it would create a commuter system, not just a train line that dumps people at a destination.
“Getting people to the Meadowlands is kind of like the tail wagging the dog,” he said. “Yes, it would be nice to get people by transit to the sports complex or whatever else gets built there. If the only reason you are building something to the Meadowlands was to get people to the sports complex a few times a year, it would probably be difficult to justify doing it.”
Heck said that was one of the reasons rail was never brought to the site.
“They just didn’t think it was necessary to do that at that point in time,” she said. “To me, that was a major move that should have been made.”
Sarlo, who sits on the Bergen Light Rail Committee with Heck, favors a spur from the Bergen Line and thinks such a move might entice the teams into staying.
“The simplest and easiest way is passenger rail off of the Bergen Line that would basically have a spur out to the Meadowlands Sports Complex,” he said. “I think the arena, the Nets, and the Devils would be very interested.”
The teams, however, have shown little interest in remaining in the Meadowlands, regardless of transportation options.
Sarlo hopes to secure funding for the plan from the federal government as the renewal of Tea 21, the transportation funding plan, approaches next year.
Any move to bring rail to the Meadowlands would be welcome by riders.
“You have to get there super early if you want to get a decent spot (for an event), and it’s a nightmare to get out of there,” said Len Resto, president of the New Jersey Rail Passengers Association. “I’ve always said if you had train service … people would use it. If there was a convention center or a mall, people would utilize the train to get there.”
Work Begins On Trax Extension; Finish May Beat 2004 Deadline; Trax Work Will Affect U. Of U. Traffic
The Salt Lake Tribune
05/21/2002
Pavement that covered part of the University of Utah’s South Campus Drive is gone, and construction of the next TRAX extension is under way.
The federal government made it official Monday by delivering a “full-funding grant agreement,” a promise that Congress and the Bush administration will pay its $53.6 million share of the $89 million project.
The rest of the money will come from the Utah Transit Authority’s share of sales-tax revenues, plus $7 million from the U. in cash, rights of way and other facilities.
Officials still are working on the final construction schedule for the 1.5-mile extension from Rice-Eccles Stadium to the U. medical complex. But a preliminary schedule shows major work could end by mid-November 2003, though contractor SLC Rail Constructors has until December 2004 to finish the job.
Depending on weather, work could be suspended briefly the next two winters. Underground utility configurations also could slow construction, pushing completion well into 2004.
“Even after the rails are laid, we have to conduct extensive tests to make sure the system is operating safely,” UTA Transit-Development Director Mike Allegra said Monday. “The best I can say at this point is that trains will be operating sometime in 2004.”
Seven new light-rail vehicles to help move passengers are scheduled for delivery by the end of 2003.
The preliminary construction timetable for the 1.5-mile extension is 50% longer than the 2.5-mile segment built from downtown Salt Lake City to Rice-Eccles Stadium. The reason: The earlier project was on an expedited Olympic schedule, which gave the contractor a financial incentive to finish early. Crews worked day and night with few days off to finish before February’s 2002 Games. That $118 million route — the first branch from TRAX’s main Salt Lake City-to-Sandy line — opened in December.
The hospital extension — with three stations — is on a regular construction schedule.
Allegra’s comments came during a “groundbreaking” ceremony Monday. It was held atop the George Eccles Legacy Bridge that connects the U.’s campus with new dormitories at Fort Douglas.
UTA, congressional, city and U. officials praised the light-rail project — and voters for approving a quarter-cent sales-tax hike making such expansions possible.
“Most consumers will never miss the extra money, but it will make a huge, huge difference,” Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson said.
The first phase of construction already has closed South Campus Drive to cars west of 1500 East to University Street.
When work begins on the next segment — shutting down South Campus Drive from 1500 East to Guardsman Way — traffic will be restored through the first segment.
Segment 3 runs from Guardsman Way to Wasatch Drive. Unlike the first two segments, one lane of traffic in each direction will stay open during construction. Segment 4 stretches from that intersection to the start of Medical Drive, just beyond the Eccles Legacy Bridge. Again, one lane each way will remain open. Same goes for the final segment, to Primary Children’s Medical Center.
A unique feature could be incorporated into the station near the Legacy Bridge, said Tom Christensen, the U.’s liaison for the project.
Officials are weighing whether to add a second boarding platform for westbound trains stopping at the station. This would allow passengers flooding onto TRAX after special events at the Huntsman Center to board from both sides.
Sacramento, Calif., Transit Agency Completes Stage Of Light-rail Extension
Sacramento Bee
05/21/2002
A celebration Monday marked the official completion of track work for the south line of the light-rail extension to Meadowview Road.
The ceremony marked 75% completion of the south line, which is set to open September 2003.
The project has included 200,000 square feet of sound walls, 2,000 welds, 49,000 ties and 65,000 tons of rock ballast.
As noteworthy, however, is the arrival of the first of 40 new light-rail train cars from Spain.
“The first car body shell arrived last week and is out at the McClellan Business Park assembly plant,” said Mike Wiley, spokesman for Sacramento Regional Transit.
The initial light-rail vehicle body was manufactured in Spain by one of Europe’s premier rail car producers: Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles.
The Madrid firm, a 75-year-old railway equipment company, is building its first light-rail cars for the U.S. market.
The new cars will be compatible with old RT cars and will be paid for with state and federal funds. The cars will come with security cameras, more spaces for wheelchairs and increased aisle space. Riders will no longer sit “knee to knee,” as in the cars now in use.
CAF got the contract by beating out light-rail carmakers from Japan, Italy and the subsidiary of a German firm, Siemens, which made all the cars now in operation on the RT light-rail line.
The CAF car shells will be outfitted at the former McClellan Air Force Base in a hanger that CAF converted into an assembly plant.
To conform with federal “buy America” regulations, the majority of the vehicle parts must come from the United States and final assembly must be done in this country.
Still to be done on the light-rail line is the building of a light-rail bridge over Florin Road and construction of seven stations.
The south line is a two-phase 11.2-mile extension to Elk Grove.
The first phase, celebrated Monday, extends the line 6.3 miles from downtown to Meadowview Road. That phase is expected to add 15,000 passengers to the light-rail system by 2015.
“This is going to allow people real, meaningful choices,” said Steve Cohn, a longtime RT board member and city councilman.
The ceremony was next to an abandoned warehouse at 18th and R streets. The building will be converted to a grocery store and housing — a good fit along a light-rail line, he said.
The $222 million downtown-to-Meadowview project includes $111 million in federal funds, $28 million in state transportation improvement program funding and $83 million in Proposition 116 clean air and transportation funds.
“The investment we are making in transit is paying off,” said Jeff Morales, California Department of Transportation director. “For the last several years, transit ridership in California has grown far faster than it has nationally.”
At the same time the south line is being built, an extension to Folsom is being readied. Grading to allow construction of the Folsom line is proceeding, Wiley said.
The extension is expected to be open to Sunrise Boulevard in December 2003 and to downtown Folsom one year later.
Madrid Gets New Metro Linking Capital To Airport In 12 Minutes
Agence France Presse
05/21/2002
A new metro line opened in the Spanish capital Tuesday, linking Barajas airport to the city centre in 12 minutes and allowing passengers to register their baggage in town.
The line, inaugurated by Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, was part of one of the biggest infrastructure schemes built in Madrid in recent years.
It consists of a huge underground station beneath the central Paseo de la Castillana where three metro lines, five regional train lines and several bus routes intersect.
China Uses Home-grown Technology In Urban Rail Networks
XINHUA GENERAL NEWS SERVICE
05/21/2002
China has successfully developed a core technology in operating railway systems, which will further boost the boom in urban rail transport.
Within recent years, China’s major cities have all put the building of urban rail systems at the top of their planning lists. In the next few years, the combined length of urban railways will grow by another 400 km in 15 of China’s big cities, involving an investment of 130 billion yuan.
China used to depend heavily on imported equipment and facilities when building subway systems. However, the China Zhuzhou Time Group has broken this dependency by developing the core technology itself — the auxiliary converter of the rail traction control system.
The technology has quickly been adopted in the construction of the Tsuen Wan Subway Line in Hong Kong, according to a contract signed by Zhuzhou Time and the HK Railway Co. Ltd on April 16. The company beat such international big names as Japan’s Mitsubishi and Toshiba to win bids for the 70 million yuan project.
This is seen as a breakthrough in the development of China’s railway technology.
Also in April, Zhuzhou Time clinched four other contracts with urban rail builders in cities like Beijing and Nanjing with total contractual capital worth over one billion yuan.
According to the long-term urban development strategy drafted by a dozen Chinese cities, investment in building rail networks is estimated at some 700 billion yuan. Large-scale urban rail systems will greatly ease traffic congestion problems and reduce pollution in cities and hence is supported by local governments.
China’s home-grown railway technology has the obvious advantage of low cost, which meets the need for large-capacity urban rail systems.
On April 12, Beijing ordered the largest batch so far of electric carriages to be used on light rails, worth 1.2 billion yuan.
The municipal government of Beijing has approved a 180 billion budget to improve urban infrastructure before it hosts the 2008 Olympics. Some 90 billion of the budget will be used on transport, of which rail will constitute an important part.
Shanghai plans to have 11 subways and seven or eight “fast rail lines” covering 6,340 square meters of urban areas, and also linking booming high-tech zones, tourist spots and Chongming Island in the city’s suburban areas.
Some analysts say that strong sales of family cars in China, boosted by the recent price cut, has forced traffic authorities to seek ways to ease increasingly serious congestion in cities, leading to the construction of light rail networks. Meanwhile, awareness of the need for urban environmental protection is cited for the growth in rail traffic.
Calthorpe Clashes Over Metro Contribution
Birmingham Post
05/21/2002
Birmingham’s wealthiest private landowner is objecting to new regulations that would force it to make a financial contribution towards the Midland Metro extension through Edgbaston.
Calthorpe Estates, which owns 1,550 acres covering some of the city’s smartest addresses, lodged an objection to the city council’s insistence that developers seeking planning permission must help pay for the construction of the pounds 52 million tram line to Five Ways.
Calthorpe owns vast tracts of land around the west side of Five Ways, including the Edgbaston Shopping Centre, Swallow Hotel and the National Westminster Bank complex.
The estate also owns Edgbaston cricket ground and has other property holdings in Scotland.
Birmingham’s revised Unitary Development Plan, setting out planning policy for the next ten years, proposes greater retail and commercial development at Five Ways.
But the new UDP takes a tougher stance on Metro costs.
At the moment developers are ‘encouraged’ to contribute towards Metro. The revised UDP says firms ‘will be expected’ to contribute. Emrys Jones, chief planning officer for Birmingham, said: ‘Calthorpe Estates have objected to the proposed new policy on the grounds that developers should not be required to contribute towards the proposed Midland Metro extension.’
Mr Jones made it clear the council would not back down. He said it was right that proposers of new retail and commercial schemes in and around Five Ways, which were certain to result in more journeys by car, should contribute towards improved public transport.
He added: ‘I consider it is entirely reasonable to seek contributions towards the Metro extension from developers of major traffic-generating schemes in the vicinity.’
The dispute between Calthorpe Estates and the council is likely to feature in a public inquiry to be held in November.
Victory for Calthorpe would be a blow for the council which routinely uses so-called Section 106 agreements to force developers to contribute towards environmental improvements in return for planning permission.
Andrew Coulson, Birmingham cabinet spokesman for regeneration, said it was right that Calthorpe should contribute a ‘reasonable amount’ towards Metro costs because shops in the area would benefit from the new light rail link.
Andrew Russell-Wilkes, development director for Calthorpe Estates, insisted the objection to the UDP did not indicate a lack of enthusiasm for Midland Metro.
Mr Russell-Wilkes added: ‘Calthorpe Estates has been a long time supporter of this scheme, contributing to feasibility studies in order to bring it forward.
‘Our objection lies more in our need for further clarification of the developer’s position with the local authority concerning planning applications for development close to this scheme.’
2 Rail Backers Oppose Plans They Say Are Too Costly
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
05/22/2002
Two leading rail transit advocates are jumping off the train to oppose transit plans that they say have grown too expensive.
Architect David Kahler and attorney Robert Bauman, both longtime light rail supporters, say $91.5 million in federal money earmarked for the Milwaukee Connector project would be better spent on a $176 million Milwaukee-to-Madison high-speed train line than on a $300 million electric bus or light rail system linking downtown to Miller Park and the east side.
The Milwaukee Connector study has not yet produced final recommendations. But it is moving away from light rail — running electric vehicles powered by overhead wires on tracks in reserved lanes of streets — because planners believe that technology would be too expensive.
Kahler says he has “been having more and more second thoughts” and no longer believes the Milwaukee area has the population density for light rail or electric buses. He remains enthusiastic about the 110-mph train line to Madison, which is stalled by a congressional debate on Amtrak’s future.
Bauman said, “I agree with him 100%” about high-speed rail being more viable than the connector project.
Connector study committee Chairman Peter Beitzel said he was baffled by Bauman’s stand. High-speed rail will do nothing to improve urban transportation, and the $91.5 million set aside for the connector must be used for public transit in the Milwaukee area, said Beitzel, a vice president of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce.
(Question: does “FasTracks” proposal also include considerable highway construction??)
RTD Will Seek Tax Hike For More Rail Trains Would Go To Longmont, Golden
The Denver Post
05/22/2002
Commuter rail lines would be extended to Longmont, Golden and Highlands Ranch and would be funded by a tax increase under a proposal RTD will unveil next month.
The Regional Transportation District wants to revise the FasTracks rail expansion plan to include an extension of a proposed Denver-to-Boulder rail line along the Diagonal Highway to Twin Peaks Mall in Longmont, RTD General Manager Cal Marsella said Tuesday night.
FasTracks is RTD’s $4.5 billion plan to add as many as six new light-rail and commuter-rail lines in the Denver metro area.
If metro Denver voters approve a sales-tax increase to fund FasTracks, the plan also would extend the southwest corridor light-rail line to Highlands Ranch and double parking capacity at light-rail stations that are to be built in the T-REX corridor, Marsella said.
‘We strongly support this project,’ Littleton Public Services Director Charles Blosten said of the proposed rail link to Highlands Ranch. ‘When it is built, it will really take away traffic congestion at Mineral (Avenue) and Santa Fe (Drive).’
At RTD’s monthly board meeting Tuesday night, Marsella said the transit district also hopes to extend a proposed west corridor light-rail line to the Jefferson County Administration and Courts Facility just off U.S. 6 in Golden.
Earlier plans called for the west line, from Denver through Lakewood along a 13th Avenue rail line, to terminate near West Colfax Avenue and U.S. 6. The proposal would extend it to the Jeffco government center.
Earlier this month, the Colorado General Assembly passed a transportation measure that allows RTD to ask voters in the seven-county Denver metro area for a hike in RTD’s sales tax from the current 0.6% to 1%.
The 67% tax increase would amount to an additional 4¢ on each $10 purchase.
RTD’s staff has not decided whether to push for a vote of Denver-area residents this November or next year on the tax increase, Marsella said.
FasTracks also likely would earmark money for high-frequency rapid transit using buses between the Broadway light-rail station and downtown Denver’s Civic Center area along Lincoln Street and Broadway.
Earlier Tuesday, an RTD committee agreed on the final alignment of the proposed extension of the southwest corridor light rail to Highlands Ranch.
It calls for extending the line from the current end-of-line station at Mineral Avenue south along Santa Fe Drive to C-470. After bridging over C-470 just east of Santa Fe, light-rail would stop at a new station with about 800 parking spaces, said RTD project manager Mike Turner.
From that station, rail cars would travel east on the south side of C-470 to a new end-of-line station at the junction of C-470 and Lucent Boulevard in Highlands Ranch that will include 600 parking spaces. The proposed 2.5-mile extension would cost about $112 million.
Bi-state’s Top Priority Is To Restore Bus Routes; Annual $22 Million Share Of Tax Money Wouldn’t Help Fund Metrolink Extension
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
05/22/2002
Transportation Taxes
If Missouri voters approve new taxes in August to pay for highways and public transportation, Bi-State Development Agency’s leader said Tuesday the agency will use its annual $22 million share to restore bus service cut last fall — not to help fund the cross-county MetroLink expansion.
“We’d be getting about half of what we really, really need,” said Larry Salci, executive director of the regional public transportation system. “But if this passes, it basically would take Bi-State out of what I call ‘ cup in hand’ going to the city and county annually to maintain service.”
The statewide referendum will ask voters to increase the sales tax by a half-cent and fuel taxes by 4 cents a gallon. It would raise about $500 million a year — including $63 million for public transportation statewide. Bi-State now gets about $3.9 million a year from the state.
At an April 16 meeting of the St. Louis County Council, Salci said Bi-State has enough money to extend MetroLink from Forest Park to Shrewsbury, but after 2006 or 2007, it will have to make deep cuts to operate the transit system if more state money is not allocated.
That had county leaders concerned — as it does Ken McCoy, a St. Louis organizer for ACORN, Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. McCoy believes that Bi-State’s elimination of 12% of bus routes last fall was done to benefit MetroLink.
“What we care about are the poor people and senior citizens who rely on Bi-State buses to get around,” McCoy said. “We’re afraid they’ll rely on the people who ride the buses to bail MetroLink out.”
McCoy said ACORN intends to present Bi-State’s board of commissioners with 3,000 signatures Friday from riders demanding that no more routes be cut, transfers eliminated and fares increased.
Bi-State gets $23 million a year in federal money, but $17 million of that goes for maintenance and repairs, Salci said. The $22 million in state money would free up that $17 million to buy new buses, rail cars and equipment.
Among the bus service Salci hopes to restore is the Forest Park shuttle, which served institutions and attractions in the park and the nearby Central West End neighborhood.
“Even if this doesn’t pass, we absolutely have to find a way to reinstate that service,” he said.
In other Bi-State developments Tuesday, the East-West Gateway Coordinating Council’s executive advisory committee:
Scrapped a proposed bus transfer station at Shaw and Vandeventer avenues near the Missouri Botanical Garden and transferred the $2.47 million for it to build a station in west St. Louis County on Ballas Road this year. The money originally allocated for the Ballas Road station was transferred Tuesday to build a north St. Louis County transfer station in Jennings in 2003–2006. It would be the first such station in north St. Louis County.
Hired HNTB Corp. of Kansas City for $3.86 million to design the South County MetroLink extension from Shrewsbury to south St. Louis County. Planning will take two years. The money comes from a federal grant.
East-West Gateway, which is scheduled to meet next week, usually approves its advisory committee’s recommendations.
Coming To Terms With Rail
Los Angeles Times
05/22/2002
In a little more than a year, comfortable commuters aboard the new Gold Line train from Pasadena to downtown Los Angeles will be able to wave at the long line of drivers that daily snakes along the Pasadena and Foothill freeways.
Some residents were unhappy with the state Public Utilities Commission’s decision last week to approve the Gold Line without substantial design changes. But the commissioners reasoned their way to the right decision, one that could be a template for other lines in the region’s emerging light rail network.
The 14-mile line’s critics, concerned about the noise and safety risk posed by 250 trains carrying 38,000 riders a day through dense neighborhoods, had for years pushed officials to require the trains to run in long trenches through Pasadena.
That requirement would have added as much as $100 million to the Gold Line’s cost and pushed the July 2003 start date back by as much as a decade.
Instead, the PUC, which oversees rail safety, voted 3 to 2 on Thursday to proceed with the current railway design, which includes the disputed street-level crossings, although the agency did impose noise and speed reductions along some portions of the route.
Commissioner Geoffrey Brown of San Francisco, a city that has long had light rail and cable cars on congested streets, concluded that “compared to other lines that I know, this will be a safe operation.” He has hit on a big part of the problem here. Los Angeles has so little experience with commuter trains that many of us are more afraid of the trains than of the speeding motorists, drunk drivers and hit-and-run criminals who have become bread-and-butter fare for the 11 o’clock news. Those fears threaten progress on other routes, including the Exposition Line planned between Santa Monica and downtown L.A.
Of course, trains can pose a danger to motorists and pedestrians, and planners need to do all they can within reason to increase safety. But the responsibility for many accidents rests with drivers who recklessly try to beat trains to crossings and pedestrians who walk on or across tracks.
Design improvements at street crossings and an aggressive campaign to boost public awareness of train safety have cut accidents 79% in the last three years along the Blue Line, between Long Beach and Los Angeles. Local and state transportation planners have learned hard lessons from this experience, lessons they are applying to the Gold Line.
Sacramento Regional Transfer District Plans Phase II South Corridor LRT Expansion
Business Wire
05/22/2002
With the Amtrak/Folsom and South Corridor LRT (Light Rail Transit) Extension Projects well underway, the Sacramento Regional Transfer District (RT) has begun to take a more detailed look at Phase II.
Analysis of the congestion along State Route 99 (SR99) through southern Sacramento city and the city of Elk Grove has shown that the daily volume of traffic is expected to increase dramatically in the next twenty years.
To address this future congestion problem, RT is planning to expand its LRT service 4.9 miles into Elk Grove. The $200 million project would involve the laying of track and the construction of up to five (5) stations (Franklin Blvd., Center Parkway, Cosumnes River College/College Square, Power Inn Road, & Calvine/Auberry).
For project details view the entire article at www.industrialinfo.com.
Harsco’s Railway Track Maintenance Division To Develop Specialty Rail Grinder For New York City Transit System
PrimeZone Media Network
05/22/2002
HARRISBURG, Pa., May 22, 2002—Worldwide industrial services and products company, Harsco Corporation (NYSE:HSC) today announced that its Harsco Track Technologies division has been awarded a contract by the New York City Transit (NYCT) system, to develop and produce a specially designed third-rail-powered track maintenance unit for rail grinding. Valued at close to $7 million, the contract includes initial maintenance services and spare parts support as well as an option for up to two additional units.
The rail grinder unit will be operated by NYCT to re-contour rail profiles and smooth rail surface corrugations, key factors in greatly reducing train noise, extending rail life and improving passenger comfort. Delivery is scheduled for early 2004, following a 24-month engineering development and production phase.
The unit is believed to be the first of its kind to be engineered and built expressly for third rail operation, meaning that all power will be drawn from an electrified rail running parallel to the track instead of the unit’s customary on-board diesel engine. Using third rail power eliminates engine exhaust emissions, a critical factor for metropolitan transit systems like New York’s, which include a large number of tunnels as well as underground subway lines.
New York City Transit is one of the most extensive and complex public transportation systems in the world, operating more than 230 route-miles of track. Its trains carry an annual ridership of 1.3 billion passengers. Harsco Track Technologies is the largest track maintenance services and equipment organization in North America, and the second largest in the world. The division serves a global market for railway track maintenance, estimated at more than $1.6 billion. In addition to metropolitan transit systems, key customers include major Class 1 railroads, regional and short line carriers, and industrial railways, all on a worldwide basis.
Unruly Passengers To Be Caught On Video
The Dominion (Wellington)
05/22/2002
LATE-NIGHT train passengers who “act up” could land themselves a starring role on Tranz Metro’s Most Wanted List.
Two closed-circuit cameras that feed live computer images back to Wellington Railway Station have been installed by specialist technologies company Guardall in commuter train carriages as part of a $6000 two-month trial.
If successful, cameras will be installed on all 20 late-night trains and, further down the track, across the region’s entire fleet.
They could also be used to beef up security at train stations, especially in the Hutt Valley.
Tranz Metro national passenger manager Ross Hayward said the cameras were installed following concerns raised by staff during an audit of safety and security measures.
“This project will allow us to assess whether the cameras will assist our staff in dealing with some of the on-board behaviour problems they experience,” he said.
That behaviour could include refusing to pay the fare, swearing at or being abusive to train guards, drinking alcohol and smoking on carriages and vandalism.
Photo images could be used to identify offenders and issue trespass notices or, in the case of serious offences, be passed on to police.
Guards could “tag” an incident or suspicious behaviour by pressing a hand-held alarm.
Late-night trains are also patrolled by Wellington City Council “Walkwise” security guards.
Guardall spokesman Peter Stothers said the cameras were installed in vandal-resistant casings.
Though they were not “bullet proof”, anyone trying to interfere with them would leave a clear and non-erasable image of themselves, he said.
Digital Camera Plans For Jarvis Rail Workers
Construction News
Jarvis is considering issuing digital cameras to all of its railway workers so they can record the state of the tracks during maintenance.
Jarvis chief operating office, Kevin Hyde confirmed the news but denied that it was connected to the Potters Bar derailment. Poor maintenance by Jarvis has been cited as a possible reason for the crash
Mr Hyde said: “We have been looking at the possibility for some time. It is about speeding up the admin process for work to be done. It allows engineers to make decisions without having to wait for reports.”
Jarvis insists its work on the track was conducted in accordance with procedures agreed with Railtrack and carried out by properly qualified employees.
It said it was not yet possible to say what the root cause of the derailment was and claimed a deliberate act of sabotage could be to blame for missing nuts on the faulty points which caused the derailment.
Jarvis is battling to restore investor confidence in its business but since the crash, the contractor has seen its share price plummet.
This week the firm showed Construction News photographs of the points, which it claimed supported its vandalism theory. A metallurgist employed by Jarvis said the shiny thread of one of the bolts could not have been off for more than 24 hours. Critics suggested that the nuts may have been off since a Jarvis maintenance team carried out work in the points 10 days previously.
Jarvis has been shortlisted for what is believed to be Railtrack’s largest ever construction package Jarvis, Balfour Beatty, GrantRail, First Engineering, Carillion, Amey-Serco a and a team featuring Amec and French firm ETF will receive bid documents tomorrow (Friday) for 19 five-year plain track renewal deals. valued at a total of £700 million per year. Two further un-named European firms are also understood to be bidding for the contracts.
The same line up will receive tenders four weeks later for six switch and crossing deals worth £120 million per year. Both sets of contracts can be extended by a further five years providing the contractors’ performance comes up to scratch, taking the total value of the works up to £8.2 billion. Tenders for plain track renewals will be returned in early July with the switch and crossing following in early August. Contracts will be awarded in phases starting in October and carrying through until the end of the year.
Alstom Wins Commuter Train Order Worth €380 Million In Sweden
The Regulatory News Service
22 May 2002
ALSTOM has won an order worth approx. €380 million to supply AB Transitio/Storstockholms Lokaltrafik (SL), the Swedish regional train operator, with 55 regional trains, along with an option for up to 50 additional trains. These trains will be used for service in the greater Stockholm area, and form a major part of the region’s integration service plan.
Within the scope of this contract, ALSTOM will supply 55 x 6-car CORADIA LIREX trains, which will be designed according to the conditions unique to Stockholm commuter traffic. The base requirements include fast acceleration levels, as the stations are close to one another; numerous and wide doors (12 doors on each side, each measuring 130 cm) to ensure fast passenger flow; full low floor, for increased accessibility; and capacity to function in strongly variable weather conditions. Each train will have a capacity of around 390 seated and 540 standing passengers. The trains will be able to operate at speeds up to 160 km/h vs 120 km/h for the existing trains, thereby significantly reducing travel times.
The trains will be manufactured by ALSTOM in Germany, Belgium and France. The first units are expected to be commissioned in 2005.
This contract follows the order won at the beginning of 2001 for the supply of 43 CORADIA DUPLEX regional trains for the state-owned operator SJ AB, for a total of €300 million. ALSTOM also supplied the rolling stock for the 40 km rail link between Stockholm and the Arlanda airport, which was successfully commissioned in 1999.
Let Us Out, It’s Not Britain!
Daily Star
05/22/2002
ASYLUM seekers brought havoc to France again last night when they mistook a local train for a service bound for Britain.
More than 40 refugees raced towards the commuter train as it passed through the Frethun freight yard.
They soon realised their mistake as it headed along the north French coastline and began banging on windows.
The service was brought to a stop and a rail guard leapt out telling them it was not heading for the Channel Tunnel.
Commuters peered from the windows as Afghans and Kurds attempted to clamber on board, unaware of the mistake.
When they were told where they were heading they began fleeing the train. An eyewitness said: “They presumed that as the train was in the freight yard it would be going through the Chunnel.
“Passenger trains very rarely pass through the Frethun yard.
“The thought of a comfortable seat to Britain was obviously very appealing.”
More than 50 were later arrested by French police after scampering through holes in security fencing.
Federal Transit Administrator Announces Federal Funding To Salt Lake City
Federal Document Clearing House, Inc.
05/23/2002
Federal Transit Administrator Jennifer L. Dorn today announced that the Federal Transit Administration has entered into a $53.6 million Full Funding Grant Agreement (FFGA) with the Utah Transit Authority (UTA) for the Medical Center Light Rail Transit (LRT) line.
“President Bush has proposed $7.2 billion for the Federal Transit Program as part of the FY 2003 budget, further reinforcing this Administration’s commitment to public transportation as a strategic investment,” said Administrator Dorn.
“In communities across the country, federal dollars are being leveraged to stimulate funding for critical public transportation projects. For the hardworking citizens in the Salt Lake City area, the payoff is vibrant and thriving communities with safe and convenient access to employment, medical care and the many activities of daily life.”
The Medical Center Extension project is a 1.5-mile LRT system extending from the University Line station at Rice-Eccles Stadium to the University of Utah Health Science Complex. The proposed Medical Center rail line includes three low platform stations and will connect to the existing North/South LRT corridor. Service is scheduled to begin in 2004, with ridership estimated at 4,100 average weekday boardings, 3,400 of whom will be new riders.
Dorn added, “Salt Lake City has a lot to be proud of, including its outstanding performance in safely and effectively transporting nearly 2.4 million Olympic spectators and visitors, as well as its regular customers, during the Olympic 2002 Winter Games.”
An FFGA is the federal government’s commitment to support a transit project over the course of several fiscal years, contingent upon the availability of funds. As funds are appropriated, the full funding projects receive priority consideration.
Freeway Plan Gets Bumpy Reception; Most Speakers At Hearing Call For Trains, More Buses
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
05/23/2002
Milwaukeeans called for more buses and trains, not more freeway lanes, at a public hearing Wednesday evening.
“This expensive and wasteful freeway plan should be quickly put out of its misery,” east side resident Scott Stieg said of a proposed $6.25 billion plan to add lanes to 127 miles of freeways as the aging system is rebuilt over the next 20 years.
Mary Lohmeier, also of Milwaukee, added, “If we have billions of dollars to spend, we should spend it on buses, so you only have to wait 10 minutes.”
The freeway plan is a preliminary recommendation from a Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission advisory committee, based on projections that traffic congestion would double without more lanes.
Milwaukee city officials say freeways should be widened only in the suburbs, leaving I-94 and I-43 at six lanes through the city.
Ken Yunker, the planning commission’s assistant director, said 90% of the traffic on Milwaukee County freeways comes from county residents and businesses.
That drew a sharp retort from District Attorney E. Michael McCann, whose Story Hill neighborhood is near a proposed double-deck stretch of I-94.
“Only a half-wit wouldn’t appreciate that most of that traffic (near Miller Park) is going to and from Waukesha County,” McCann said. “Don’t diminish the quality of life of those who have chosen to live in this county... to save them a few minutes.”
McCann was referring to projections that widening I-94 to eight lanes would prevent a five-minute increase in travel time from downtown to U.S. Highway 45.
But those few minutes add up to hundreds of thousands of hours of productive time, countered Philip Hohlweck of Milwaukee, one of the few freeway backers in the crowd of about 60 at the Downtown Transit Center.
Hohlweck said the freeway represents the freedom to go wherever he wants whenever he wants. He called it “part of what makes me American... If we do nothing, we lose our freedom.”
East sider Tim Richter replied: “Driving is a privilege, not a right. It’s kind of sad that it’s become a patriotic image of our society.”
Several speakers called for adding commuter rail and light rail lines, and for improving bicycle paths and walkways as alternatives to driving in congested traffic. City planner Mike Maierle said those ideas should be part of the freeway plan, as he urged when he worked for the state Department of Transportation.
City officials had raised similar issues in a newsletter, and displays in the hearing room featured a point-by-point rebuttal of the newsletter.
The displays said the plan projects major increases in public transit and local streets but more lanes are needed to stem traffic congestion.
All of the speakers — particularly the youngest — said choices now would shape the future.
“I think what you plan to do is a mistake that, sooner or later, my generation will be asked to clean up,” said 16-year-old Milwaukee resident Amanda Reavey.
The next hearing is tonight at the Goodwill Industries Waukesha Community Center, 1400 Nike Drive, Waukesha, with an open house at 4 p.m., a presentation at 6 and public comments at 6:30.
Uncertainty Lingers For Elevated Rail System In Indianapolis
The Indianapolis Star
05/23/2002
We know what the city’s first elevated rail system will look like.
You can’t miss the tall, arching tracks hovering above Senate Avenue, casting shadows on the street with thick, concrete columns.
We even know what the train cars on Clarian Health’s People Mover will look like. Unveiled Wednesday, they are rather boxy, with no seats but plenty of standing room.
What we don’t know is how this futuristic light rail system will play in Indianapolis.
How will city residents, politicians and members of the medical community respond to the People Mover when it begins daily operations next spring?
A lot is riding on the answer.
Can you picture an elevated rail system floating above Downtown streets? With stations at key locations like Circle Centre mall and Conseco Fieldhouse?
“We’ve thought all along that if (the People Mover) is successful and well-accepted, then it would be the best thing to happen for transit in Indianapolis,” said Mike Peoni, manager of the Metropolitan Planning Organization, which has recommended light rail for the Northeast Corridor and is poised to study a rail link connecting Downtown to Indianapolis International Airport.
“Although we have been looking at ‘at-grade’ (street level) systems, there is a big advantage with elevated rails,” Peoni said. “They eliminate any conflict with on-street traffic and busy intersections. I guess you can say we are going to keep an open mind.”
Clarian’s People Mover system is a privately funded, $34 million project designed to make travel easier among its three local hospitals: Methodist, Riley and Indiana University. Officials anticipate 500,000 people will use the system every year.
It will be open to the public and will be free.
But even more important, it will give local residents a preview of what may come in the future.
“I think it would be great,” said Roland Lima, 36, a Downtown worker who commutes from Fishers. “I hate taking my car out for lunch. It takes forever to find a parking spot. And then I lose my place when I get back to work.”
Mayor Bart Peterson’s administration has supported the idea of light rail as a key to easing gridlock on local highways. When the city signed off on the deal for Clarian’s People Mover, it worked out a clause that would allow for a future connection of another private, or public, rail line.
“We are going to watch and see how this works,” said Melina Kennedy, a spokeswoman for the mayor. “We have no specific plans for an elevated rail, but it can’t hurt that we are going to be able to see something live in action.”
An important key could be how the Clarian line plays into the future of promising life-sciences research in the city. Which leaves open the possibility of a future connection with the Eli Lilly and Co. campus on the south side of Downtown. This is not the first time light rail has been considered Downtown. The Northeast Corridor study included a loop around the city’s core. The next study involving the airport will likely include the same.
Elevated rails are favored by some because the system does not interfere with street traffic and is quieter than street-level transportation. But they are also more costly, and some critics feel the elevation can hurt street-level businesses.
“They take the life off the streets,” said Tom Gallagher, an urban design professor who directs the city’s regional center plan through Ball State University’s College of Architecture and Planning in Indianapolis.
Recently completed concepts by Ball State students are already showing connections to the People Mover.
“If it is done in a real creative way, I think an elevated system could work,” Gallagher concedes. “But with an elevated system, it is always there in front of you. At least with a street-level system, it is only there when the train comes by.”
Laura Swartley, 30, who enjoyed riding the rails when she worked in Washington, says Indianapolis needs to do something.
“This city is one of the worst transportation cities I have ever been to,” she said. “Downtown is a lot more popular than it used to be, and I think a rail connection is essential to its future.”
Study: Rail Would Increase Madison Traffic Congestion; The Steering Committee Will Recommend A Rail System To The City Council This Summer
Wisconsin State Journal
05/23/2002
Although a new study suggests a proposed commuter rail system in Madison may mean more traffic congestion and delays at intersections, rail steering committee members intend to recommend a rail system to the City Council this summer.
The consultant rail study was discussed by the special Madison-county Transport 2020 Committee on Wednesday evening.
A rail system remains the best hope to move more people around the Isthmus in coming decades, said Dane County Sup. Scott McDonnell, 1st District, and co-chairman of the 2020 committee.
It would allow commuters to get from outlying areas to Downtown in 15 minutes no matter how much traffic increases in the future, while drivers are struggling in a “rolling parking lot,” he said.
“Even though it may cause some delays, it’s not the main (streets) that are affected,” McDonnell said.
This may make a pricey commuter and street rail system a harder sell, advocates concede.
“You may be asked to wait 20 seconds longer, but if we did nothing, you may be sitting intraffic 15 to 20 minutes longer,” said Sharyn Wisniewski, assistant to Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk. “It’s up to all of us as a community to decide what path we’ll go down.”
The opening and closing of gates for rail would cause traffic delays at 17 of 19 intersections examined in a study by consultant Cambridge Systematics of Boston. Some drivers would wait double or triple the times than without rail system.
At the intersection of First Street and East Washington Avenue, the afternoon rush hour crossing without rail is projected to average one minute and five seconds in 2020. But if a street rail system is built, the delay increases to two minutes and 22 seconds, and with commuter rail, it jumps to three minutes and 20 seconds.
The committee has a preferred alternative that would build a first-phase, $200 million commuter rail link between Middleton and East Towne Mall and later add street rail in Madison and commuter rail to Sun Prairie, McFarland or other outlying areas at an estimated cost of $11 million per mile.
The committee, which is still studying options and gathering public comment, is expected to make final recommendations next month.
There isn’t the space or political will to build bigger roads on the Isthmus, and a rail system is needed to bring increasing numbers to and from Downtown in the next two decades, supporters maintained.
The projected traffic delays are longer than expected but represent a “worst case,” said David Trowbridge, a Madison transportation planner and Transport 2020 project administrator.
The study, for example, does not account for turns that could still be made when gates are down, he said.
It’s a trade-off between accepting increased delays at some intersections and moving many more people, said Dave Cieslewicz, a committee member and executive director of 1000 Friends of Wisconsin.
“I’m sure this (new data) will be used by critics,” he said. “But we’ve got to keep our eyes on the prize.”
News Digest
Sacramento Bee
05/23/2002
Open house at plant Tours of a new plant that will produce Sacramento Regional Transit District light-rail cars will be offered from 6 to 8 p.m. May 30 at McClellan Park.
The Spanish company Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarries (CAF) and RT are partners in the manufacturing plant at 5001 Bailey Loop in North Highlands.
The 50,000-square-foot plant will increase production this year and will bring 80 to 100 jobs to the area. Final assembly and testing for 40 light-rail trains will take place at the CAF facility.
Presentations by Bonnie Pannell, RT board chairwoman and Sacramento City Councilwoman, Roger Dickinson, county supervisor, and Andres Arizkorreta, CAF general manager, will be made at the May 30 event.
Siemens Announces New Light Rail Orders; Repeat Orders From Existing Customers Affirm Satisfaction
PR Newswire
05/23/2002
Siemens Transportation Systems, Inc. (STS) announced today three new orders for light rail vehicles (LRVs). The orders come to STS from existing customers. In all, a total of 36 new LRVs were ordered by the transit agencies for St. Louis, Houston, and San Diego. The three orders total more than $95 million.
St. Louis’ Bi-State Development Agency has announced the award of 22 new SD460 vehicles for the expansion of its MetroLink system into St. Louis County. Opened in 1993, the system currently utilizes 31 SD400 LRVs and 34 SD460 LRVs. The SD460 accommodates 72-seated passengers with room for an additional 106 standees. Delivery of these vehicles is expected to begin in 2004. This is Siemens’ fourth vehicle order from Bi-State making it Siemens’ second largest LRV customer in the U.S.
For Houston, Siemens will provide an additional three S70 LRVs to supplement the original order for 15 LRVs of the same design. The Houston Metro project is a 7.5-mile starter line that will connect downtown Houston with Reliant Park. Siemens is the prime contractor for the supply of systems elements in the fast track project scheduled to begin revenue service in 2004. The newest member of the Siemens vehicle family, S70 is a 70% low-floor light rail vehicle capable of carrying over 200 passengers at 66 mph.
Eleven new S70 low-floor light rail vehicles also have been ordered by San Diego’s Metropolita |
