Due to a technical fault all writing about trains has been delayed

Those of you out there who noticed I occasionally write about Auckland train related 'things' might wonder why I've not been posting about the recent train chaos. The answer is quite simple - I gave up on the trains a couple of weeks back, and I've been driving to/from work.

After a couple of pretty miserable days trying to commute during the flood of signal failures, I thought they were doing the right thing by cancelling some services and focusing on getting the work done. I wonder whether they should have cancelled more services to get an even clearer shot at making some progress - the flood of delay and cancellation related SMS messages I've been getting over the past couple of weeks would definately suggest that the current level of service isn't anything that passengers can rely on. Everyone expects delays whenever construction work is being carried out alongside a live service, but it really feels like things have been too bad for too long, and with too little communication from the companies involved. Also worthy of mention is no offer of any discount for passengers willing to put up with 25-45 minute delays each way on their daily commutes.

So for now I've voted with my wallet. I'm lucky that I can adjust my work hours to mostly miss rush hour and that a bunch of free parking slots just opened up where I work. I really feel for those of you out there who are stuck putting up with this. Still, I keep hoping that if enough people manage to get angry enough then perhaps they might start getting vocal, and maybe, just maybe, someone out there will listen.

 Print | Posted on Sunday, March 18, 2007 9:40 PM |