Indian Pacific...........

Chris Bell writes:

Luke O'Zade wrote:
Not very good for GSR


http://www.abc.net.au:80/news/storie...16/2218225.htm


Nor for ARTC I imagine. They will be paying GSR a truckload of money
over that one I expect. What a disaster.

Interesting how GSR employed the same 'you must not leave the train' tactic
that CityRail uses when they have major disruptions. 8-) I know all about
that since I was stuck in the middle of quite a few instances where I've
driven my train right up the bum of one in front that's stuck behind another
that's stuck behind another, etc. and more were up the bum of my train.
Nowhere to go, impossible to contain the passengers, and there was NO
support from CityRail management.

13 hours without being permitted to get out of the train is not acceptable,
even using RailCorp 'containment' policy standards! GSR unfortunately would
have not been in a position to dictate terms here since it would have been
ARTC telling them they can't allow people off the train, not their own
management. However I'm betting there's a lot more to this issue that the
media isn't reporting.... So we'd not talk about it on RailPage or it well
get censored!

Craig.
--
Craig Dewick - HO-Scale Railway Modeller and Professional Train Manager at
http://lios.apana.org.au/~craigd or if you're game!
More good stuff at RailZone Australia - http://www.railzone.org - No Fundies!
http://lios.apana.org.au/mailman/lis...us_rail_safety for Oz Rail Safety

On Apr 18, 9:28*am, C. Dewick wrote:
Chris Bell writes:
Luke O'Zade wrote:
Not very good for GSR

*http://www.abc.net.au:80/news/storie...16/2218225.htm

Nor for ARTC I imagine. They will be paying GSR a truckload of money
over that one I expect. What a disaster.

Interesting how GSR employed the same 'you must not leave the train' tactic
that CityRail uses when they have major disruptions. 8-) I know all about
that since I was stuck in the middle of quite a few instances where I've
driven my train right up the bum of one in front that's stuck behind another
that's stuck behind another, etc. and more were up the bum of my train.
Nowhere to go, impossible to contain the passengers, and there was NO
support from CityRail management.

13 hours without being permitted to get out of the train is not acceptable,
even using RailCorp 'containment' policy standards! GSR unfortunately would
have not been in a position to dictate terms here since it would have been
ARTC telling them they can't allow people off the train, not their own
management. However I'm betting there's a lot more to this issue that the
media isn't reporting.... So we'd not talk about it on RailPage or it well
get censored!

Craig.
--
Craig Dewick - HO-Scale Railway Modeller and Professional Train Manager athttp://lios.apana.org.au/~craigdor if you're game!
More good stuff at RailZone Australia -http://www.railzone.org- No Fundies!http://lios.apana.org.au/mailman/lis...rail_safetyfor Oz Rail Safety

As this incident occured 2 kms west of Broken Hill It comes under
Great Southern Railway. I would suggest that they would have the same
rules as when it was called Australian National. As a former employee
who worked the Indian Pacific the doors are locked in that you stay on
the train.

As this is due to track work in NSW. It is obvious that communication
between the two states is at an all time low. I can remember back in
the late 1970's when work was being carried out in NSW. All passengers
were airlifted to Sydney from Adelaide. We had to travel from Port
Pirie to Adelaide by the broad gauge train.

As Craig says keep quiet on this one.

eridge1 wrote:

As this incident occured 2 kms west of Broken Hill It comes under
Great Southern Railway.

GSR is just an operator who lease track access from ARTC. ARTC does all
track work from Lithgow to Western Australia (Kalgoorlie or Perth?)
Also from Macarthur to Melbourne and Adelaide.

I would suggest that they would have the same
rules as when it was called Australian National. As a former employee
who worked the Indian Pacific the doors are locked in that you stay on
the train.

Yes, it is still the same policy.

As this is due to track work in NSW. It is obvious that communication
between the two states is at an all time low.

Nothing to do with the states. GSR and ARTC head offices are very close
together in Adelaide. The track work was organised from Adelaide.

It is not clear whether the decision to hold passengers on board was
made by GSR or ARTC.


--

---
Function call to load Windows: here_piggy_piggy_piggy_piggy
---

David Johnson
usenet.at.trainman.id.au
http://www.trainman.id.au
------------------------------------
These comments are made in a private
capacity and do not represent the
official view of RailCorp.

On 18 Apr, 00:28, C. Dewick wrote:

Chris Bell writes:

Luke O'Zade wrote:

Not very good for GSR

http://www.abc.net.au:80/news/storie...16/2218225.htm

Nor for ARTC I imagine. They will be paying GSR a truckload of money
over that one I expect. What a disaster.

Interesting how GSR employed the same 'you must not leave the train' tactic
that CityRail uses when they have major disruptions. 8-) I know all about
that since I was stuck in the middle of quite a few instances where I've
driven my train right up the bum of one in front that's stuck behind another
that's stuck behind another, etc. and more were up the bum of my train.
Nowhere to go, impossible to contain the passengers, and there was NO
support from CityRail management.

13 hours without being permitted to get out of the train is not acceptable,
even using RailCorp 'containment' policy standards! GSR unfortunately would
have not been in a position to dictate terms here since it would have been
ARTC telling them they can't allow people off the train, not their own
management. However I'm betting there's a lot more to this issue that the
media isn't reporting.... So we'd not talk about it on RailPage or it well
get censored!

Craig.


Before furiously cross-posting may I suggest you take a bit of time to
consider what the "uk" part of "uk.railway" denotes.

On Fri, 18 Apr 2008 06:08:23 -0700 (PDT), Mizter T
wrote:


On 18 Apr, 00:28, C. Dewick wrote:

Chris Bell writes:

Luke O'Zade wrote:

Not very good for GSR

http://www.abc.net.au:80/news/storie...16/2218225.htm

Nor for ARTC I imagine. They will be paying GSR a truckload of money
over that one I expect. What a disaster.

Interesting how GSR employed the same 'you must not leave the train' tactic
that CityRail uses when they have major disruptions. 8-) I know all about
that since I was stuck in the middle of quite a few instances where I've
driven my train right up the bum of one in front that's stuck behind another
that's stuck behind another, etc. and more were up the bum of my train.
Nowhere to go, impossible to contain the passengers, and there was NO
support from CityRail management.

13 hours without being permitted to get out of the train is not acceptable,
even using RailCorp 'containment' policy standards! GSR unfortunately would
have not been in a position to dictate terms here since it would have been
ARTC telling them they can't allow people off the train, not their own
management. However I'm betting there's a lot more to this issue that the
media isn't reporting.... So we'd not talk about it on RailPage or it well
get censored!

Craig.


Before furiously cross-posting may I suggest you take a bit of time to
consider what the "uk" part of "uk.railway" denotes.


Well the news report did mention a disgruntled English tourist, not
that I see how they can complain.

Disruptions to train services would probably be the norm fro them.....

As this is due to track work in NSW. It is obvious that communication
between the two states is at an all time low.


Advice from uk.railway is you would be best advised to get that sorted
out because if communication isn't right, who knows, you could end up
all on different gauges or something.

While nobody wants to sit in a train that's going nowhere for 13 hours and
nobody wants to miss connections to planes etc ...

Having travelled on the Indian Pacific, there's a huge difference between
spending that time on the Indian Pacific versus being stuck on a commuter
train for the same period of time. On the Indian Pacific, you are expected
to spend a long time onboard it so there are all the facilities for food,
drink, lounges, reading materials etc. You would be a lot more comfortable
for 13 hours than you would be trapped on a commuter train.

And I can understand that they don't want their passengers roaming about
outside the train particularly if there are other rail lines in use. Firstly
there are probably some safety regulations they don't want to breach and
secondly there is the risk of litigation if anyone was injured or killed
while wandering about outside.

Since if they were only 2km out of Broken Hill as claimed, an obvious
question is why didn't they get some buses to come and transport the
passengers into Broken Hill to the railway station, from which they could
have wandered around safely in the Broken Hill shops etc (assuming it wasn't
the middle of the night) until the train was fixed and back at the station.
My guess is that they didn't expect it to take 13 hours and that it was
probably one of those situations where they expected it to be fixed in "just
another half an hour" so it was never worthwhile making an arrangements to
get the passengers off the train because the fix was imminent. And I guess
the other issue for them is if they had the passengers roaming around Broken
Hill, how would they round them up again when the train was finally ready to
leave? If they transported the passengers to (say) the railway station and
told them to remain there, then frankly they would be less comfortable at
the station than if they stayed on the train.

So I can see why the passengers were upset about staying on the train, but
from the perspective of the staff, all other courses of action may have
involved some risks, albeit ones that might not have been evident to the
passengers.

Kerry

Kerry Raymond wrote:

And I can understand that they don't want their passengers roaming about
outside the train particularly if there are other rail lines in use. Firstly
there are probably some safety regulations they don't want to breach and
secondly there is the risk of litigation if anyone was injured or killed
while wandering about outside.


It would have been single track where they were stopped. IIRC, the
train would have been on an embankment near Oxide Street.

Since if they were only 2km out of Broken Hill as claimed, an obvious
question is why didn't they get some buses to come and transport the
passengers into Broken Hill to the railway station, from which they could
have wandered around safely in the Broken Hill shops etc (assuming it wasn't
the middle of the night) until the train was fixed and back at the station.
My guess is that they didn't expect it to take 13 hours and that it was
probably one of those situations where they expected it to be fixed in "just
another half an hour" so it was never worthwhile making an arrangements to
get the passengers off the train because the fix was imminent. And I guess
the other issue for them is if they had the passengers roaming around Broken
Hill, how would they round them up again when the train was finally ready to
leave? If they transported the passengers to (say) the railway station and
told them to remain there, then frankly they would be less comfortable at
the station than if they stayed on the train.

The complaints were from people who were alighting at Broken Hill. Some
of them could have looked out the window and seen their house. They
were the people who just wanted to get off and walk away, not the
through passengers. Buses should have been easy to organise, as there
would have been a few waiting at the station to take passengers on town
tours. As the train would have arrived mid-late afternoon, it would not
have left until the early hours of the morning.


--

---
All great discoveries are made by mistake.
---

David Johnson
usenet.at.trainman.id.au
http://www.trainman.id.au
------------------------------------
These comments are made in a private
capacity and do not represent the
official view of RailCorp.

allan tracy wrote:


Advice from uk.railway is you would be best advised to get that sorted
out because if communication isn't right, who knows, you could end up
all on different gauges or something.

Lol, you've robably hit it on the head; they were surrupticiously
changng the bogies for the different guages.

shades of bogie changes undertaken at Maree in the 70's. Oh wait, they
told us to ge off one set of passenger cars and wait for hours on the
platform whilst the whole goods train was transshipped.