In the Sydney Morning Herald today there is a beat up over the delays in the construction of new trains to replace Sydney’s old air-conditioned trains. Currently the project is months behind schedule and rapidly becoming a disaster for the state government. The track taken by the SMH in its article argues that shortcuts should be taken in the safety of the trains to speed things up. Naturally I completely disagree and believe safety should be the first priority but have a read:
RailCorp’s stringent controls have caused huge delays in the building of carriages…
…with Australians it’s mainly technical requirements. We think the burden is not necessary.
NSW laws require that an eight-carriage Waratah train must be built to withstand a head-on collision at a speed of 55km/h without any structural damage or passenger injuries. In China the bar is set at 10 km/h.
As pointed out by a fellow workmate, one can only wonder what the accident and death rate is on the Chinese railways compared to Australia. The old Sydney trains are very worn out and need replacing, but I would rather wait a year to get things right rather than a rush job that could result in serious problems.
