Re: Costs of Sydney’s driverless train conversion outweigh the benefits
  Tony Galloway

The obvious solution is Worker Control, where both real workers and those who use the services they provide benefit through higher wages and lower fares, as with public transport in Barcelona between 1936 and 1939 :

Worker Management of the Barcelona Public Transit System, 1936-1939 | workerscontrol.net https://www.workerscontrol.net/authors/worker-management-barcelona-public-transit-system-1936-1939

No bludging bosses standing in the way of workers democratically organising the workplace for maximum efficiency and utility to users, done under difficult conditions.

Tony

> On 17 Aug 2022, at 10:23, TP historyworks@...> wrote:

>

> I use the term "featherbedding" across the board, including (often especially!) management, which latter I suspect is much of the problem in Vancouver. All aboard the gravy train to greater (personal) prosperity!

>

> Tony P

>

> On Wednesday, 17 August 2022 at 09:52:47 UTC+10a...@... http://aapt.net.au/ wrote:

> “Featherbedding” - that’s a term used by the resentful, overpaid, boss buggered fellatists in management bullshit jobs (the most useless and redundant parasites in any workplace) to describe decent, union secured and enforced working conditions.

>

> Most employers would prefer to use slaves or forced prison labour if they had the choice, so they’ll always complain that their employees get “too much” or that there are too many off them.

>

> See : World's media pan Rinehart's $2 a day African miner comments https://www.smh.com.au/business/worlds-media-pan-rineharts-2-a-day-african-miner-comments-20120906-25fpq.html

>

> Nothing says “boss” more than Pig Gina.

>

> Tony

>

>

>> On 17 Aug 2022, at 08:57, TP histor...@... <applewebdata://C68B5C63-57A4-4760-8490-BA5610B7B69B>> wrote:

>>

>

>> I think two issues are being confused there Greg - automated trains and staff featherbedding. Automated commuter trains are the preferred choice in any city that is able to introduce them and there's a large and growing number of complete GoA4 (crewless) systems.

>>

>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_automated_train_systems#Grade-of-Automation_4_systems https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_automated_train_systems#Grade-of-Automation_4_systems

>>

>> The paper I posted a while ago pointed out that studies had found a reduction in operating costs of some 50% compared with a system with drivers (never mind comparing with Sydney with two crew on each train, that would likely be more than 50% reduction). Sydney Trains is subsidised for about 70% of its operating costs iirc. Sydney Metro is expected to at least break even when it reaches a critical mass.

>>

>> The situation in Vancouver sounds like gross maladministration where a whole heap of people have succeeded in setting up a massive workplace featherbed for themselves. The lack of political oversight (or collaboration) in that would surely require some sort of probity investigation. Besides control room and maintenance staff, Sydney metro has an attendant at each station and additional roving staff, but nowhere near the numbers required for a crewed system.

>>

>> Tony P

>>

>> On Wednesday, 17 August 2022 at 08:22:06 UTC+10gregsut...@... http://ozemail.com.au/ wrote:

>> From: <dmalcolmjohnston=yaho...@ <>groups.io http://groups.io/>

>>

>>

>>

>> A correction, in my haste I have made an error, the Expo and Millennium lines, had in 2019 over 900 employees.

>>

>> The Canada Line being a P-3, the number of employees are deemed proprietary and not released. In 2011 there was 180 unionized employees and i an trying to get a more current number but i do remember i was rather shocked by the number of people working on the SkyTrain light metro system.

>>

>> It is safe to say that well over 1,200 unionized workers work on all three driverless rapid transit lines.

>>

>> Another hint is that TransLink has almost 1,000 employees earning over CAD$100K, but that is it no breakdown of who works where.

>>

>> From my records, The Expo line has cost about 60% more to operate than Calgary's C-Train, with both lines being about the same length, but that was about decade ago.

>>

>> TransLink does not like to release reliable numbers so it is is difficult to get accurate figures, except by gleening local media for PR slip ups.

>>

>> Suffice to say, no one has copied Vancouver's transit planning, nor its exclusive use of driverless trains.

>>

>> Malcolm

>>

>>

>>

>

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