tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/railways-8081/articlesRailways – The Conversation2023-12-19T01:03:42Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2193322023-12-19T01:03:42Z2023-12-19T01:03:42ZAustralia’s freight used to go by train, not truck. Here’s how we can bring back rail – and cut emissions<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566231/original/file-20231218-21-yjmb5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=377%2C8%2C4906%2C3715&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Until the 1960s, railways <a href="https://www.bitre.gov.au/sites/default/files/is_034.pdf">dominated freight</a> across every distance bar the shortest. Much freight went by sea, and some by truck. </p>
<p>But then trucking grew, and grew, and grew, while rail’s share of freight outside mined ore has shrunk and domestic shipping freight is diminished. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/jan/29/of-fumes-and-freight-why-australian-cargo-is-increasingly-being-sent-on-trucks-not-trains">By the mid-70s</a>, trains carried only about 23% of domestic non-bulk freight (such as consumer goods) and trucks took 65.5%. </p>
<p>By 2021–22, trains took just 16.7% and trucks took almost 80%. Just 2% of freight between Melbourne and Sydney <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/nov/02/dwindling-use-of-rail-freight-puts-australias-emissions-targets-at-risk-industry-warns">now goes by rail</a>, while road freight is projected to keep growing. </p>
<p>That’s a problem, given heavy trucks are big emitters. Rail uses <a href="https://www.railfutures.org.au/2017/07/submission-to-inquiry-into-national-freight-and-supply-chain-priorities">roughly a third</a> of the diesel as a truck would to transport the same weight. Transport <a href="https://www.dcceew.gov.au/climate-change/strategies/annual-climate-change-statement-2023">now accounts for</a> 21% of Australia’s emissions. While electric cars and the long-awaited <a href="https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/infrastructure-transport-vehicles/vehicles/australian-fuel-efficiency-standard-cleaner-cars-australia">fuel efficiency standards</a> are projected to cut this by seven million tonnes, trucking emissions are expected to keep growing. </p>
<p>It won’t be easy to change it. But if we improve sections of railway track on the east coast, we could at least make rail faster and more competitive. </p>
<h2>How did road freight become dominant?</h2>
<p>Since the 1970s, the volume of freight carried by Australia’s rail and road have both grown. But rail’s growth has largely been in bulk freight, such as the 895 million tonnes of iron ore and 338 million tonnes of coal exports <a href="https://www.industry.gov.au/publications/resources-and-energy-quarterly-december-2023">in 2022–23</a>. </p>
<p>Road freight has grown enormously due largely to non-bulk freight such as consumer goods. Freight <a href="https://www.bitre.gov.au/publications/2022/australian-infrastructure-and-transport-statistics-yearbook-2022">carried by road has grown</a> from about 29 billion tonne-kilometres in 1976–77 to 163 billion tonne-kilometres in 2021–22. (A tonne-kilometre measures the number of tonnes carried multiplied by distance). In that period, non-bulk freight carried by rail increased from about 10 to 34 billion tonne-kilometres.</p>
<p>Why? An <a href="https://www.bitre.gov.au/publications/2022/australian-aggregate-freight-forecasts-2022-update">official report</a> gives key reasons such as expanding highway networks and higher capacity vehicles such as B-doubles. </p>
<p>Spending on roads <a href="https://www.bitre.gov.au/publications/2022/australian-infrastructure-and-transport-statistics-yearbook-2022">across all levels of government</a> is now more than A$30 billion a year.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566232/original/file-20231218-21-trtwqh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="front of truck with sign saying without trucks Australia stops" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566232/original/file-20231218-21-trtwqh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/566232/original/file-20231218-21-trtwqh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566232/original/file-20231218-21-trtwqh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566232/original/file-20231218-21-trtwqh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566232/original/file-20231218-21-trtwqh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566232/original/file-20231218-21-trtwqh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/566232/original/file-20231218-21-trtwqh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">From freight trains to road trains: trucks have taken the throne from trains.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
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<p>Federal grants enabled the $20 billion reconstruction of the entire Hume Highway (Melbourne to Sydney), bringing it up to modern engineering standards. A similar sum was spent on reconstructing most of the Pacific Highway (Sydney to Brisbane). </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/transport-emissions-have-doubled-in-40-years-expand-railways-to-get-them-on-track-122794">Transport emissions have doubled in 40 years – expand railways to get them on track</a>
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<p>What do our trains get? In 2021–22, the Australian Rail Track Corporation had a <a href="https://www.artc.com.au/about/reports/annual-reports">meagre $153 million</a> to maintain its existing 7,500 kilometre interstate network. </p>
<p>This is separate from the 1,600km Inland Rail project which will link Melbourne to Brisbane via Parkes when complete. If the massive Inland Rail project is completed in the 2030s, it could <a href="https://www.artc.com.au/uploads/Environmental-Social-Governance-Report-2022.pdf">potentially cut</a> Australia’s freight emissions by 0.75 million tonnes a year by taking some freight off trucks. But this freight-only line is some way off – the first 770km between Beveridge in Victoria and Narromine in New South Wales is <a href="https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/infrastructure-transport-vehicles/rail/inland-rail#:%7E:text=The%20Australian%20Government%20is%20taking,New%20South%20Wales%20by%202027.">expected to be complete</a> by 2027.</p>
<p>As a result, the authority maintaining Australia’s interstate rail tracks is “really struggling with maintenance, investment and building resilience”, <a href="https://minister.infrastructure.gov.au/c-king/interview/qa-afr-infrastructure-summit">according to</a> federal Infrastructure Minister Catherine King.</p>
<p>This makes it harder for rail to compete, as Paul Scurrah, CEO of Pacific National, Australia’s largest private rail freight firm <a href="https://www.fullyloaded.com.au/logistics-news/2301/pacnat-ceo-says-it%E2%80%99s-time-to-get-australian-freight-back-on-track">has said</a>: </p>
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<p>Each year, billions in funding is hardcoded in federal and state government budgets to upgrade roads and highways, which then spurs on greater access for bigger and heavier trucks […] Rail freight operators pay ‘full freight’ rates to run on tracks plagued by pinch points, speed restrictions, weight limits, sections susceptible to frequent flooding, and a lack of passing opportunities on networks shared with passenger services</p>
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<h2>What would it take to make rail more viable?</h2>
<p>By 2030, road freight emissions are expected to increase from 37 to 42 million tonnes, while railway emissions stay steady at four million tonnes.</p>
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<p>The need to cut freight emissions has been recognised by the Australian government, which has accelerated a review of the <a href="https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/department/media/news/review-national-freight-and-supply-chain-strategy-underway">national freight and supply chain strategy</a>. </p>
<p>To date, much attention <a href="https://www.climateworkscentre.org/news/decarbonising-short-haul-road-freight-could-halve-australias-freight-emissions/">in Australia</a> and <a href="https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/0c13b23d-en/index.html?itemId=/content/component/0c13b23d-en">overseas</a> has centred on finding ways to lower trucking emissions.</p>
<p>There are other ways. One is to shift some freight back to rail, which forms part of Victoria’s recent <a href="https://www.vic.gov.au/freight-transport-decarbonisation">green freight strategy</a>. This will be assisted by new <a href="https://infrastructurepipeline.org/project/melbourne-intermodal-terminal">intermodal terminals</a> allowing containers to be offloaded from long-distance trains to trucks for the last part of their journey. </p>
<p>The second way is to improve rail freight energy efficiency. Western Australia’s long, heavy iron ore freight trains are already <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01441649808717015">very energy efficient</a>, and the introduction of <a href="https://reneweconomy.com.au/fortescue-starts-work-on-world-first-infinity-train-a-regenerating-battery-on-rails/">battery electric locomotives</a> will improve efficiency further. Our interstate rail freight on the eastern seaboard is much less efficient. </p>
<p>While the Inland Rail project is being built, we urgently need to upgrade the existing Melbourne–Sydney–Brisbane rail corridor, which has severe restrictions on speed. </p>
<p>To make this vital corridor better, there are three main sections of new track needed on the New South Wales line to replace winding or slow steam-age track. They’re not new – my colleagues and I <a href="https://australasiantransportresearchforum.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/2002_Laird_Mitchell_Adorni_Braccesi.pdf">first identified them</a> more than 20 years ago. </p>
<p>These new sections are: </p>
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<li>Wentworth – about 40km of track stretching from near Macarthur to Mittagong</li>
<li>Centennial – about 70km of track from near Goulburn to Yass</li>
<li>Hoare – about 80km of track from near Yass to Cootamundra. </li>
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<p>If we replaced 260km of steam-age track with these three sections and another 10km elsewhere, we would cut two hours off the Melbourne–Sydney freight transit time. Energy use would fall <a href="https://australasiantransportresearchforum.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/2002_Laird_Mitchell_Adorni_Braccesi.pdf">at least 10%</a>. Better still, faster tilt trains could then run, potentially halving the Sydney–Melbourne passenger trip to 5.5 hours. </p>
<p>Track straightening on the Brisbane–Rockhampton line in the 1990s made it possible to run <a href="https://www.queenslandrailtravel.com.au/railexperiences/ourtrains/tilttrain">faster tilt trains</a> and heavier, faster freight trains. </p>
<p>One challenge is who would build this. This year’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/apr/06/astonishing-cost-of-inland-rail-doubles-to-30bn-as-review-savages-coalition-over-project">review of the Inland Rail project</a> amid cost and time blowouts has raised questions over whether the ARTC is best placed to do so. </p>
<p>One thing is for sure: business as usual will mean more trucks carrying freight and more emissions. To actually tackle freight emissions will take policy reform on many fronts. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/shifting-freight-to-rail-could-make-the-pacific-highway-safer-4882">Shifting freight to rail could make the Pacific Highway safer</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219332/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span> Philip Laird owns shares in some transport companies and has received funding from two rail-related CRCs as well as the ARC. He is affiliated, inter alia, with the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport, the Railway Technical Society of Australasia and the Rail Futures Institute. The opinions expressed are those of the author.</span></em></p>Trains once carried most of our freight. Could a return to rail help us meet our emissions cutting goals?Philip Laird, Honorary Principal Fellow, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2135302023-09-27T20:25:25Z2023-09-27T20:25:25ZTransportation paved the way for colonization — it can also support reconciliation<iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/transportation-paved-the-way-for-colonization-it-can-also-support-reconciliation" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>As Canada marks the <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/campaigns/national-day-truth-reconciliation.html">National Day for Truth and Reconciliation</a> on Sept. 30, individuals and institutions are being urged to acknowledge the colonial origins of this country, which are rooted in the persecution and genocide of Indigenous nations. </p>
<p>There will be many meaningful conversations about ways we can each engage with and support reconciliation. However, one issue that doesn’t get enough attention is how transportation continues to be a serious challenge for Indigenous communities.</p>
<p>Various aspects of transportation are addressed in the <a href="https://nctr.ca/about/history-of-the-trc/truth-and-reconciliation-commission-of-canada/">Truth and Reconciliation (TRC) Calls to Action</a> and the <a href="https://www.mmiwg-ffada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Calls_for_Justice.pdf">Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG2S+) Calls for Justice</a>, which underscore the root causes of ongoing disparities and violence against Indigenous Peoples in Canada.</p>
<p>As a Red River Métis person and transportation researcher concerned with <a href="http://www.untokening.org/updates/2017/11/11/untokening-10-principles-of-mobility-justice">mobility justice</a>, I collaborate with equity-oriented scholars, advocates, planning professionals, municipalities and transport agencies to address transport inequities in their jurisdictions. </p>
<p>Equity-oriented transportation professionals may embrace an ethos of access to safe and dignified mobility for all, yet our practices don’t recognize how mobility injustices are impacting Indigenous communities and people. This is concerning as it undermines our pursuit of true equity for all and runs the risk of misallocating public funds. Worse, the invisibility of this issue means our communities will endure more harm. </p>
<h2>The roots of transportation injustice</h2>
<p>Transport development physically <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/documentarychannel/docs/colonization-road">paved the way for colonization</a>, and is directly linked to the chronic and <a href="http://www.nccih.ca/docs/determinants/RPT-HealthInequalities-Reading-Wien-EN.pdf">extreme social inequities</a> Indigenous communities face. Colonial city-building is founded on tools like the <a href="https://www.nwac.ca/assets-knowledge-centre/Indian-Act-Said-What-infographic.pdf">Indian Act</a>, specifically designed to <a href="https://redpaper.yellowheadinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/red-paper-report-final.pdf">remove us from our traditional lands</a>, enforce economic and political exclusion as well as spatial segregation, extract resources and control our mobility. Though each jurisdiction in Canada has its own <a href="http://www.scapegoatjournal.org/docs/12-13/SG12-13_74_Cooper_StolenCity.pdf">settler-colonial origin story</a>, the roots of transportation within this are inseparable. </p>
<p>For instance, few transportation professionals will know the history of the Métis as the “<a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/metis-road-allowance-communities">Road Allowance People</a>.” This refers to the period when Métis people <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/radio/unreserved/from-scrip-to-road-allowances-canada-s-complicated-history-with-the-m%C3%A9tis-1.5100375/forced-to-live-on-roadsides-the-dark-history-of-m%C3%A9tis-road-allowances-1.5100660">lived in road allowances</a> — spaces set aside by the Dominion Land Survey for future roads and railway lines — as a means of survival. This was a dark period of extreme poverty and housing insecurity, the impacts of which continue to marginalize and harm Métis people today. </p>
<p>There was also the <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/radio/unreserved/exploring-the-past-present-and-future-of-life-in-indigenous-canada-1.3336594/the-pass-system-another-dark-secret-in-canadian-history-1.3338520">Pass System</a>, which confined First Nations people in Western Canada to their reserves, restricting mobility at the discretion of federal Indian Agents. Under this system, police were authorized to arrest and imprison Indigenous people who were found off-reserve without a pass. </p>
<p>This system remained in effect for 60 years until at least the 1940s and <a href="https://pub-newwestcity.escribemeetings.com/filestream.ashx?DocumentId=12354">municipalities capitalized on it</a> to further their development goals.</p>
<h2>Lack of investment</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.ccnsa-nccah.ca/docs/emerging/RPT-Built-Environment-Stout-EN.pdf">Systemic under-investment in housing, infrastructure and essential services</a> in Indigenous communities contributes to transport poverty. These issues put Indigenous people at a disproportionate <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0191384">risk of traffic-related injury and death</a>. They also obstruct access to education, health care, employment, food, culture and the land. They impact the ability for Indigenous communities to <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-nwt-wildfire-evacuees-1.6948016">respond to emergencies and climate disasters</a>, <a href="https://thetyee.ca/News/2021/05/19/Indigenous-People-Barriers-Drivers-Licensing/">complicate the unity of Indigenous families</a> and more. </p>
<p>Some of these impacts may be more acute in rural, remote or isolated communities, but local governments lack an understanding of how urban Indigenous communities experience transportation and mobility. They might often see Indigenous issues as “<a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/oa-edit/10.4324/9781003199816-8/co-creating-cities-deserve-indigenous-knowledge-ginger-gosnell-myers">outside their jurisdiction</a>.” The impacts of this invisibility are likely substantial, given that <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/220921/dq220921a-eng.htm">44 per cent of Indigenous people live in Canada’s large urban centres</a>.</p>
<h2>Anti-Indigenous racism</h2>
<p>Indigenous communities experience <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/Content/Committee/432/SECU/Reports/RP11434998/securp06/securp06-e.pdf">systemic racism in policing</a>, with <a href="https://findingspress.org/article/28345-police-enforcement-of-cycling-offences-a-case-study-in-winnipeg-manitoba">disproportionate amounts of ticketing</a> and overrepresentation in arrests, with rates as high as <a href="https://thediscourse.ca/vancouver-island/systemic-racism-in-policing-across-unceded-territories-in-b-c-demands-reform-says-human-rights-commissioner">10 times that of white people</a> in some areas. </p>
<p>Racial profiling has been linked to abusive arrests and <a href="https://spheresofinfluence.ca/canadas-best-kept-secret-starlight-tours/">Starlight tours</a> — the deadly practice of police driving an Indigenous person to a remote area and leaving them there. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-colonial-racism-fuels-saskatchewans-criminalization-of-indigenous-men-205260">How colonial racism fuels Saskatchewan's criminalization of Indigenous men</a>
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<p>The impacts of colonization are gendered, as evidenced by the disturbing rate of violence against Indigenous women, girls, Two-Spirit, transgender and gender-diverse people. </p>
<p>Transport poverty contributes to this by forcing Indigenous people onto the streets and highways, making them vulnerable to <a href="https://www.nwac.ca/assets-knowledge-centre/Fact_Sheet_Violence_Against_Aboriginal_Women_2022-05-06-192019_swwk.pdf">violence</a> from <a href="https://www.mmiwg-ffada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/P03P03P0201_Toronto_Exhibit_27_Deif.pdf">law enforcement</a>, <a href="https://shiningthespotlight.nwac.ca/issue01/article-05.html">industry workers</a> and <a href="https://greystonebooks.com/products/unbroken">others</a>. The most well-known example is British Columbia’s <a href="https://highwayoftears.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/Highway-of-Tears-Symposium-Recommendations-Report-January-2013.pdf">Highway of Tears</a>.</p>
<p>Land dispossession and a lack of adequate housing and transportation options also enable disproportionate rates of <a href="https://nwac.ca/assets-documents/Issues_in_Human_trafficking_and_MMIWG2S.pdf">human trafficking</a> of Indigenous women and girls. There have also been instances of <a href="https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/this-was-not-a-snowball-man-who-threw-metal-hitch-at-barbara-kentner-guilty-of-manslaughter/">vehicular violence and identity-based attacks</a> by members of the public against Indigenous people. </p>
<h2>Right to security</h2>
<p>Many of the factors underpinning these issues violate the principles of the <a href="https://social.desa.un.org/issues/indigenous-peoples/united-nations-declaration-on-the-rights-of-indigenous-peoples">United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples</a> (UNDRIP), including the right to a life free from discrimination; to life, physical and mental integrity, liberty and security of person; and the right to improve economic and social conditions.</p>
<p>The urgency of Indigenous mobility injustices cannot be overstated. It’s time for planning professionals, municipalities and transport agencies to recognize that transportation is a reconciliation imperative too. There are things we can do to embed reconciliation in our work more meaningfully:</p>
<p><strong>Be diligent about the truth.</strong> As transport professionals, our work has a direct impact on Indigenous Peoples and their rights. We can be inspired by jurisdictions taking concrete actions like a <a href="https://yearoftruth.ca/">year of truth</a> or those mandating <a href="https://www.edmonton.ca/city_government/initiatives_innovation/community-engagement-indigenous-framework">staff training and education</a> for cultural competency as ways of seeking truth. Such actions are uncovering the ways municipal institutions and structures have dispossessed and violated Indigenous Peoples, and illuminating the path forward.</p>
<p><strong>Create mechanisms for change.</strong> Hire Indigenous planners, create dedicated positions for Indigenous relations, and centre relationships with local and urban Indigenous communities. These have been key to enacting structural change and helping jurisdictions to <a href="https://www.womentransformingcities.org/trc-calls-to-action">make progress on reconciliation</a>, but are also contingent on support from mayors and councils. </p>
<p><strong>Align transportation equity goals with UNDRIP.</strong> Actions should be in line with the TRC Calls to Action and the MMIWG Calls for Justice. </p>
<p><strong>Recognize the actions of Indigenous communities.</strong> A colonial mindset to transportation planning <a href="https://makeshiftmobility.substack.com/p/decolonizing-transportation">assumes communities are incapable of creating solutions to their problems</a>. But we must recognize that <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/winnipeg-safe-ride-service-ikwe-1.4621212">Indigenous communities are already responding</a> to mobility injustices. Governments and professionals must actively listen to Indigenous experiences and recognize how Indigenous people are already filling the gaps.</p>
<p>In doing so, we can broaden our collective perspective on transportation equity, align it with the principles of reconciliation and respond to longstanding calls for justice for Indigenous Peoples.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213530/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jaimy Fischer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Transport development paved the way for colonization and is directly linked to the chronic and extreme social inequities Indigenous communities continue to face to this day.Jaimy Fischer, Post Doctoral Researcher, Human Geography, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2062872023-06-13T01:50:09Z2023-06-13T01:50:09ZCan the new High Speed Rail Authority deliver after 4 decades of costly studies?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530260/original/file-20230606-16-dq12tk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=616%2C0%2C3377%2C2245&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Tokaido Shinkansen in Japan.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Philip Laird</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Australia’s new <a href="https://minister.infrastructure.gov.au/c-king/media-release/all-aboard-high-speed-rail-authority">High Speed Rail Authority</a> comes into being today. <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/Bills_Search_Results/Result?bId=r6904">Created</a> by the Albanese government, the authority and its <a href="https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/department/media/news/high-speed-rail-authority-board-members-announced">newly named board</a> have been set a challenging task: “<a href="https://minister.infrastructure.gov.au/c-king/media-release/all-aboard-high-speed-rail-authority">bring high-speed rail to reality</a>”. </p>
<p>Nearly four decades after it was first proposed, Australia must surely hold the world record for high-speed rail studies with no construction. I estimate the cost of all these studies to date to be about A$150 million (both public and private money, in 2023 dollars). Yet not one kilometre of a land corridor for a high-speed rail track has been reserved. </p>
<p>The challenge for the Albanese government is to go further than yet more studies and start construction. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/more-than-ever-its-time-to-upgrade-the-sydney-melbourne-railway-187169">More than ever, it’s time to upgrade the Sydney–Melbourne railway</a>
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<h2>How many countries have high-speed rail?</h2>
<p>The International Union of Railways (UIC) <a href="https://uic.org/passenger/highspeed">defines</a> high-speed rail as including “infrastructure for new lines designed for speeds of 250km/h and above; upgraded existing lines for speeds of up to […] 220 km/h”. </p>
<p>Starting in 1964 with the Tokaido Shinkansen in Japan linking Tokyo to Shin-Osaka, high-speed rail now operates in <a href="https://uic.org/passenger/highspeed/article/high-speed-data-and-atlas">20 countries</a>. Another <a href="https://uic.org/IMG/pdf/uic-atlas-high-speed-2022.pdf">14 countries</a> are building or planning high-speed rail links. </p>
<p>In Indonesia, a high-speed rail service from the capital Jakarta to Bandung is due to begin this August. Construction of high-speed rail in India and Thailand is advanced.</p>
<p>And Australia? It only rates <a href="https://uic.org/IMG/pdf/uic-atlas-high-speed-2022.pdf">a mention</a> by the UIC of long-term planning for high-speed rail.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/dont-abandon-plans-for-high-speed-rail-in-australia-just-look-at-all-the-benefits-139563">Don't abandon plans for high-speed rail in Australia – just look at all the benefits</a>
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<h2>A history of projects that came to nothing</h2>
<p>In 1984, CSIRO proposed the Very Fast Train connecting Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne. A consortium undertook many studies. A Senate committee inquiry was held. However, the proposal failed to win government support and did not proceed.</p>
<p>Next was the pragmatic Speedrail proposal. This was to link Sydney to Canberra using existing track from Sydney to Macarthur and new track to Canberra. Prime Minister John Howard enthusiastically endorsed the project before the 1998 election, <a href="https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;query=Id%3A%22media%2Fpressrel%2F2014HNC04170534%22;src1=sm1">saying</a>:</p>
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<p>The very fast train will rival airline flight as the preferred means of travel for countless millions of Australians for decades to come.</p>
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<p>The Howard government gave approval to the Speedrail consortium to “prove up” their proposal. The cost was to be <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/environment/greens-to-push-40bn-fastrail-link-to-sydney-20100422-tfvj.html">about $4.5 billion</a>. About $1 billion would have been required from government, but this <a href="https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6599786/canberra-sydney-high-speed-rail-bid-was-always-too-expensive/">was denied</a>. It was a lost opportunity for Australia. </p>
<p>Instead, the Howard government funded yet <a href="https://trid.trb.org/view/1317361">another study</a>, which effectively found high-speed rail to be too expensive. So also did a <a href="https://apo.org.au/node/33517">two-stage study</a> by the Gillard government, in which Anthony Albanese was the <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/FlagPost/2014/January/high-speed-rail">minister overseeing the planning process</a> until Labor lost office in 2013. It costed a high-speed rail network for the east coast at $114 billion (in 2012 dollars). </p>
<p>More parliamentary inquiries have since followed. And the <a href="https://www.nfra.gov.au/">National Faster Rail Agency</a> formed in 2019 has expended further funds. This agency now falls under the High Speed Rail Authority. </p>
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<h2>The NSW factor</h2>
<p>In 2018, the New South Wales government began its own <a href="https://theconversation.com/nsw-on-a-slow-track-to-fast-trains-promised-regional-rail-upgrades-are-long-overdue-160932">investigations into faster rail</a>. Launched by the then premier, Gladys Berejiklian, the resulting report by UK rail expert Andrew McNaughton has not been released. It was <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/revealed-secret-high-speed-rail-plan-backs-newcastle-sydney-wollongong-link-20221222-p5c87g.html">reported</a> last year to have recommended new tracks between Newcastle, Sydney and Wollongong, along with a Sydney-Canberra upgrade and better services to the state’s central west. </p>
<p>Other NSW reports also remain under wraps. In late 2022, the former NSW government stopped investigating high-speed rail or the upgrading of existing lines. These studies were <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/03/nsw-government-slams-brakes-on-high-speed-rail-plans-after-spending-100m-on-studies">reported</a> to have cost about a further $100 million (my estimate of $150 million doesn’t include this figure, as it was for studies of both high-speed and faster rail). </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/nsw-on-a-slow-track-to-fast-trains-promised-regional-rail-upgrades-are-long-overdue-160932">NSW on a slow track to fast trains: promised regional rail upgrades are long overdue</a>
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<p>NSW now lags far behind Queensland, Victoria and Western Australia. All these states have trains moving at 160km/h over upgraded tracks. This includes the Queensland <a href="https://www.queenslandrailtravel.com.au/railexperiences/ourtrains/tilttrain">electric tilt train</a>, which has been running between Brisbane and Rockhampton since 1998. </p>
<p>There are also questions about the supply of new intercity trains for NSW. These and other questions are the subject of a <a href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/walsh-review-implementation">review</a> set up by the recently elected state Labor government. </p>
<h2>So, what happens next?</h2>
<p>There is some opposition to high-speed rail in Australia. In 2020, the Grattan Institute <a href="https://grattan.edu.au/report/fast-train-fever">said</a>:</p>
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<p>The east-coast bullet train advocated by the federal ALP would be an expensive folly. </p>
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<p>Last December, the shadow minister for infrastructure, Bridget McKenzie,
<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/dec/20/sydney-melbourne-rail-upgrades-could-be-transformative-coalition-says">said</a>: </p>
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<p>While very fast trains has great appeal, the reality is that it is decades away from being built – even if governments were to get serious about it.</p>
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<p>McKenzie favours upgrades of existing lines.</p>
<p>The minister for infrastructure and transport, Catherine King, <a href="https://minister.infrastructure.gov.au/c-king/media-release/all-aboard-high-speed-rail-authority">said</a> last week the first priority of the High Speed Rail Authority is planning and corridor works for the Sydney-to-Newcastle section of the network. The government is providing $500 million for this. In addition, this project will require a much-improved, in-house, rail engineering capability. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/vital-signs-sydney-to-newcastle-fast-rail-makes-sense-making-trains-locally-does-not-174341">Vital Signs: Sydney to Newcastle fast rail makes sense. Making trains locally does not</a>
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<p>The project will also need to be delivered without the problems that the Inland Rail freight line project has encountered. The Albanese government <a href="https://minister.infrastructure.gov.au/c-king/media-release/inland-rail-independent-review-announced">ordered</a> an independent <a href="https://www.inlandrail.gov.au/understanding-inland-rail/independent-review">review</a> of Inland Rail, which found serious shortcomings. It will now only <a href="https://www.inlandrail.gov.au/understanding-inland-rail/publications-and-reports/australian-government-response-independent-review-inland-rail">proceed this decade</a> on a rail link between Melbourne and Parkes. Questions remain over the section from Parkes to Brisbane. </p>
<p>The government is also <a href="https://minister.infrastructure.gov.au/c-king/media-release/securing-australias-120-billion-nation-building-infrastructure-pipeline">reviewing other major infrastructure projects</a>. </p>
<p>One project that would produce many benefits is to build a new track between Macarthur and near Mittagong. This would be close to the reconstructed section of the Hume Motorway that opened in 1980. The benefits include faster, more energy-efficient train travel between Sydney and each of Melbourne and Canberra. It would also lower emissions. </p>
<p>A Macarthur-Mittagong deviation could be the start of a staged process to construct high-speed rail between Sydney and Melbourne. High-speed rail advocacy group <a href="https://www.fastrackaustralia.net">Fastrack</a> and others have proposed this approach. It would give regional Australia “<a href="https://www.facebook.com/WINNewsIllawarra/videos/illawarra-rail-fail-song/266906713961408/">more trains, and faster trains</a>, to get us on our way”.</p>
<p>A growing population is waiting for Australia to join the 34 countries that have or are about to get high-speed rail.</p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/transport-is-letting-australia-down-in-the-race-to-cut-emissions-131905">Transport is letting Australia down in the race to cut emissions</a>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/206287/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Philip Laird owns shares in some transport companies and has received funding from the two rail-related CRCs as well as the ARC. He is affiliated, inter alia, with the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport, the Railway Technical Society of Australasia and the Rail Futures Institute. The opinions expressed are those of the author.</span></em></p>Some 34 countries have high-speed rail or are about to get it. Yet since it was for proposed for Australia in 1984, no local plan for high-speed rail has got further than the drawing board.Philip Laird, Honorary Principal Fellow, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2071692023-06-08T20:37:01Z2023-06-08T20:37:01ZOvercrowded trains serve as metaphor for India in Western eyes – but they are a relic of colonialism and capitalism<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531013/original/file-20230608-21-vya0qq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C573%2C4532%2C3010&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">By the end of the 19th century, railways were being used by millions across India.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/en-gare-des-hommes-montent-jusque-sur-le-toit-des-wagons-news-photo/947835870?adppopup=true">Keystone-France/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A devastating <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/04/what-caused-the-india-train-crash-a-visual-guide-to-what-we-know">rail crash</a> that left <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/08/brothers-breadwinners-fathers-the-lives-lost-in-indias-train-disaster">almost 300 people dead</a> has refocused international attention on the importance of railways in the lives of Indians.</p>
<p>Indeed, to many Western observers, images of men and women crammed into overcrowded cars serve as a metaphor for modern India.</p>
<p>Take, for example, a report by German newspaper Der Spiegel on India’s population surpassing China’s. Published just weeks before the accident in Odisha province on June 2, the now <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/asia/india/india-der-spiegel-racist-cartoon-population-b2327147.html">much-criticized cartoon</a> depicted a shabby Indian train <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-65395860">crammed with passengers</a> rushing past a streamlined Chinese train with only two people in it.</p>
<p>Where does this enduring image in the West of Indian railways – and of India – come from? </p>
<p>As a scholar of Indian history and author of 2015 book “<a href="http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/history/south-asian-history/tracks-change-railways-and-everyday-life-colonial-india?format=HB">Tracks of Change: Railways and Everyday Life in Colonial India</a>,” I believe the answers lie in the gigantic infrastructure projects of the 19th century – forged at the intersection of colonial dictates and capitalist demands.</p>
<h2>A carrier of freight, not people</h2>
<p>Railways remain the backbone of passenger traffic in India, transporting some <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/gallery/2020/3/25/in-pictures-railways-indias-lifeline-come-to-a-halt">23 million people daily</a>. In the pre-pandemic 2018-19 financial year, <a href="https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/transportation/railways/three-years-on-indian-railways-passenger-traffic-remains-below-pre-pandemic-numbers/articleshow/99458137.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst">7.7 billion passenger</a> journeys in India. In comparison, even after a dramatic post-pandemic increase, airline passenger traffic was <a href="https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/transportation/airlines-/-aviation/domestic-airlines-flew-123m-passengers-in-2022-dgca/articleshow/97148274.cms?from=mdr">123.2 million in 2022</a>.</p>
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<img alt="People are seen on a platform and hanging out of doorways on a train car." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531016/original/file-20230608-19-suqccx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531016/original/file-20230608-19-suqccx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531016/original/file-20230608-19-suqccx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531016/original/file-20230608-19-suqccx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531016/original/file-20230608-19-suqccx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531016/original/file-20230608-19-suqccx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531016/original/file-20230608-19-suqccx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">People board an overcrowded train at a railway station on the outskirts of New Delhi, India.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-board-an-overcrowded-train-at-a-railway-station-in-news-photo/1252255086?adppopup=true">Kabir Jhangiani/NurPhoto via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Yet, when first planned in the 1840s, India’s railways were intended to primarily transport freight and livestock, not people.</p>
<p>Indians were thought <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/tracks-of-change/2393A3B1B77CF7F2B23C8C00DDA18442#:%7E:text=Tracks%20of%20Change%20explores%20how,process%20has%20shaped%20India's%20history.">unlikely</a> to become railway passengers by directors of the English East India Co., a merchant monopoly that gradually annexed and administered large parts of India under U.K. crown control.</p>
<p>Many people at the time disagreed that Indians were immobile people, however, pointing out that the country had a long history of <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/india-in-the-world-economy/9079E07A2697FB6A122BEBFE3CC6FA13">global trade</a> across vast oceanic networks.</p>
<p>However, early colonial railway policy was driven by pervasive <a href="https://theconversation.com/orientalism-edward-saids-groundbreaking-book-explained-197429">Orientalist</a> imaginings of a people rendered immobile by poverty, living in isolated villages and constrained by religious restrictions prohibiting travel.</p>
<p>The trope <a href="https://marxists.architexturez.net/archive/marx/works/1853/07/22.htm">interlocked with colonial thinking</a> that railways would foster greater industrialization which in turn would further a capitalist economy.</p>
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<img alt="A modern high-speed train is seen in a station." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531017/original/file-20230608-19-5m7lin.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/531017/original/file-20230608-19-5m7lin.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531017/original/file-20230608-19-5m7lin.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531017/original/file-20230608-19-5m7lin.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531017/original/file-20230608-19-5m7lin.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531017/original/file-20230608-19-5m7lin.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/531017/original/file-20230608-19-5m7lin.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Vande Bharat Express train as seen in Kolkata, India.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/vande-bharat-express-train-as-seen-at-howrah-station-in-news-photo/1245840303?adppopup=true">Debarchan Chatterjee/NurPhoto via Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>They also aligned with the practical needs of a colonial trading monopoly which needed raw materials for English industries, such as cotton, to be moved swiftly and efficiently from India’s interiors to port towns, from where they could be shipped.</p>
<h2>Relegated to cheap seats</h2>
<p>To <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/tracks-of-change/2393A3B1B77CF7F2B23C8C00DDA18442#:%7E:text=Tracks%20of%20Change%20explores%20how,process%20has%20shaped%20India's%20history.">induce the “natives</a>,” as the British often referred to their colonial subjects, to use railways, the colonial government pitched low fares, especially in third-class cars – the lowest and cheapest category of rail travel.</p>
<p>The decision to introduce lower fares seems at odds with the profit-driven aims of a capitalist venture, with money raised by <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2113695">private companies</a> incorporated in the United Kingdom.</p>
<p>However, British capitalists and shareholders in these private ventures did not have to fear for their profits, which were underwritten by the Indian taxpayer. The colonial government of India guaranteed these companies a 5% annual return on their investment whether or not the venture turned a profit. </p>
<p>Despite the doubters, the new Indian <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/tracks-of-change/2393A3B1B77CF7F2B23C8C00DDA18442#:%7E:text=Tracks%20of%20Change%20explores%20how,process%20has%20shaped%20India's%20history.">railways attracted an increasing number of passengers</a>.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/history/south-asian-history/tracks-change-railways-and-everyday-life-colonial-india?format=HB">half-million passengers recorded</a> in 1854 when tracks became operational increased to 26 million in 1875. By 1900, annual passenger figures stood at 175 million and then almost trebled to 520 million by 1919-20. By the time of the partition of India in 1947 it had risen to more than 1 billion passenger journeys annually. Indeed, images of overcrowded trains came to epitomize the upheaval of partition, with the rail system used to carry swaths of uprooted peoples across the soon-to-be Pakistan-India border.</p>
<p>Third-class passengers, overwhelmingly Indians, comprised almost 90% of this traffic.</p>
<p>These escalating figures did not, however, generate a lowering of fares. Nor did they result in any substantial improvements in the conditions of overcrowded, unsanitary third-class travel.</p>
<p>Instead, railway companies sought “the greatest economy of space and load,” as <a href="http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/history/south-asian-history/tracks-change-railways-and-everyday-life-colonial-india?format=HB">one rail manager put it</a>. Inadequate rolling stock, much of it imported, exacerbated matters.</p>
<h2>A tool for ‘self-composure’</h2>
<p>The generally British railway managers seemed disinclined to remedy systematic overcrowding, which included transporting passengers in wagons meant for livestock. Rather, they insisted that such overcrowding was caused by the peculiar habits and inclinations of Indian passengers: their alleged abhorrence of empty carriages and their inclination to follow one another “like sheep” into crowded carriages.</p>
<p>These attributes were soon rendered into a more public narrative, especially among Western mindsets. Journalist H. Sutherland Stark, writing for the industry publication <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/tracks-of-change/2393A3B1B77CF7F2B23C8C00DDA18442#:%7E:text=Tracks%20of%20Change%20explores%20how,process%20has%20shaped%20India's%20history.">Indian State Railways Magazine</a> in 1929, stated that though “unversed” in railway administration and traffic control, he knew railway facilities were not the problem. Rather, Indian passengers lacked the mental preparedness, “self-possession” and “method” necessary to travel like “sane human beings.”</p>
<p>Stark suggested passenger education as a solution to the perceived problem, making railway travel a tool for “self-composure and mass orderliness.” He was not the only one to suggest a congruence between rational railway travel and reasonable public behavior. In the 1910s, though condemning railway management for perpetuating the indignities that third-class passengers faced, the nationalist leader <a href="https://www.gandhimedia.org/read_more/writings/books/books_by_gandhi/english/WRBOMGEN0510_rs.pdf">Mahatma Gandhi</a> also suggested educating railway passengers as a means to create a civic body of citizens.</p>
<h2>A continuing metaphor</h2>
<p>More than a century later, this depiction endures, though, ironically, it now serves as a foil to understanding contemporary India. In a piece published in <a href="https://www.proquest.com/docview/318482381/DBAA8BBEEC8045B3PQ/1?accountid=14605&forcedol=true">The New York Times</a> on March 12, 2005, the author lauded the then-new Delhi metro, emphasizing that it had “none of the chaotic squalor of hawkers and beggars that characterizes mainline railroads in India, nor do desperate travelers hang from the sides of the trains.”</p>
<p>As the debate rages on whether safety has taken a back seat to “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/03/modi-has-spent-billions-modernising-indias-trains-but-safety-is-biggest-need">glossy modernization projects</a>” in India – early analyses suggest <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-65801807">signaling failure</a> might have caused June 2, 2023, accident – railways continue to represent India’s history.</p>
<p>In the heyday of empire, they were deemed the technology through which Britain would drag India into capitalist modernity. In 1947, they became a leitmotif for the trauma of the <a href="https://academic.oup.com/book/32195/chapter-abstract/268346962?redirectedFrom=fulltext">partition</a> that accompanied the independence of India and Pakistan. As the coverage of Odisha accident reminds us, it continues to be a metaphor in the West for evaluating contemporary India.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207169/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ritika Prasad does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A deadly crash in India that claimed the lives of around 300 people has refocused international attention on the importance of railways in the country.Ritika Prasad, Associate Professor of History, University of North Carolina – CharlotteLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2005542023-03-02T14:25:20Z2023-03-02T14:25:20ZRoads and power lines put primates in danger: South African data adds to the real picture<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511943/original/file-20230223-703-kx83eg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C17%2C3982%2C2886&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Samango monkey choosing to use a pole bridge instead of a ladder bridge.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Birthe Linden</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>About 25 million kilometres of new roads are expected to be built around the world by <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/nature13717">2050</a>. Along with power lines and railways, roads cut through the landscape everywhere, disrupting ecosystems. This linear infrastructure prevents animals from moving safely around their habitat. It also reduces access to the resources they need, like food, sufficient space and mating partners. </p>
<p>This threat to biodiversity is a conservation issue globally, but especially in developing nations, where <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/nature13717">90%</a> of new road construction is expected. </p>
<p>The African continent is home to unique biodiversity and extraordinary landscapes. Planned <a href="https://au.int/en/videos/20190101/agenda2063-infrastructure-and-energy-initiatives">infrastructure developments</a> will certainly <a href="https://theconversation.com/kenyas-huge-railway-project-is-causing-environmental-damage-heres-how-159813">threaten</a> some of the last, unspoilt wildernesses on the continent.</p>
<p>We’re particularly concerned about the future of primates. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) lists <a href="http://www.primate-sg.org/primate_diversity_by_region/">half of the continent’s 107 primate species as threatened</a>.</p>
<p>According to the <a href="https://www.iucnredlist.org/search?query=Primates&searchType=species">IUCN</a> 18% of the world’s primates are directly affected by roads and railroads and 3% by utility and service infrastructure. These figures are based on limited research, though. The true impact is likely to be higher.</p>
<p>South Africa’s case shows why. None of the South African primate species currently have linear infrastructure listed as a threat under the IUCN. But this doesn’t mean they are not negatively affected. It just means that the lists need to be better informed.</p>
<p>South Africa is the only African country that has long-term, country-wide mortality datasets for both <a href="https://ewt.org.za/what-we-do/saving-species/wildlife-and-transport/">wildlife roadkill</a> and <a href="https://ewt.org.za/what-we-do/saving-species/wildlife-and-energy/">wildlife electrocution</a>. It’s collected by patrol staff, scientists and the general public (<a href="https://theconversation.com/tracking-science-a-way-to-include-more-people-in-producing-knowledge-159587">citizen scientists</a>). </p>
<p>Using this data, <a href="https://brill.com/view/journals/ijfp/93/3-6/article-p235_4.xml">we investigated</a> how roads and power lines affect South Africa’s five primate species: the chacma baboon (<em>Papio ursinus</em>), the vervet monkey (<em>Chlorocebus pygerythrus</em>), the samango monkey (<em>Cercopithecus mitis</em>), the lesser bushbaby (<em>Galago moholi</em>) and the greater or thick tailed bushbaby (<em>Otolemur crassicaudatus</em>).</p>
<p>All species were affected, mostly by roads. We found a total of 483 deaths captured in the databases between 1996 and 2021. The number of deaths is likely to be a lot higher, due to under-reporting. Targeted species- and area-specific surveys are needed to refine this dataset. </p>
<p>The more mortality data is available, the better we will understand impacts, know where to focus interventions and inform future infrastructure developments to lessen the human impact on biodiversity.</p>
<p>We recommend that infrastructure like roads and power lines be more prominently recognised as a direct threat when developing Red List assessments.</p>
<h2>Primate deaths</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511944/original/file-20230223-24-c9wbuu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Furry black body of monkey on the verge with trees on either side of the road" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511944/original/file-20230223-24-c9wbuu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511944/original/file-20230223-24-c9wbuu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511944/original/file-20230223-24-c9wbuu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511944/original/file-20230223-24-c9wbuu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511944/original/file-20230223-24-c9wbuu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511944/original/file-20230223-24-c9wbuu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511944/original/file-20230223-24-c9wbuu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Samango monkey lying dead at the side of a road.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Birthe Linden</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Most of the electrocution data used in our study was accessed from the <a href="https://www.eskom.co.za/">Eskom</a> Central Incident Register.</p>
<p>Roadkill data for our study was available from two sources: the national database from the Endangered Wildlife Trust’s Wildlife and Transport Programme and our own observations. </p>
<p>Since 2011, the Endangered Wildlife Trust has received records from systematic patrols on certain highways and species -and area-specific expert research surveys. Citizen science data comes from all over the country including national and regional roads, with differing speed limits, widths and vehicle usage.</p>
<p>The area surveyed by systematic patrols amounts to 1,370 km, covering 0.2% of the country’s entire road network and 0.9% of the paved road network.</p>
<p>The highest number of deaths recorded was for vervet monkeys. This was to be expected as vervet monkeys have a much wider geographic range in South Africa than both bushbaby species and the samango monkey, so they have a greater chance of encountering roads and power lines. The greater (or thick tailed) bushbaby and the samango monkey are forest associated and forests cover only about 0.1% of South Africa’s land surface area.</p>
<p>Although the total of 483 primate deaths over 25 years may not appear very high, we can assume that many remain undetected. For example scavengers might remove the dead animals, or they could be hidden by dense vegetation on road verges. They could be in remote places, in the case of power lines, or severely injured animals might die later, a distance away from the road. For roads, the actual mortality rate could be <a href="https://we.copernicus.org/articles/3/33/2002/we-3-33-2002.html">12–16 times higher</a> than the detection rate.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/statistical-ecology-can-unlock-the-power-of-biodiversity-data-in-africa-171513">Statistical ecology can unlock the power of biodiversity data in Africa</a>
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</em>
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<h2>Solutions</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511945/original/file-20230223-703-ly4rn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Person facing away from the camera looks at a monkey walking along a pole in the tree canopy." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511945/original/file-20230223-703-ly4rn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511945/original/file-20230223-703-ly4rn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511945/original/file-20230223-703-ly4rn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511945/original/file-20230223-703-ly4rn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511945/original/file-20230223-703-ly4rn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511945/original/file-20230223-703-ly4rn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511945/original/file-20230223-703-ly4rn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Samango monkey using a pole canopy bridge while observer looks on.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Horta Lacueva</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Encouragingly, there is more and more <a href="https://brill.com/display/post/news/special-issue-of-folia-primatologica-highlights-the-importance-of-canopy-bridges-to-habitat-connectivity-globally.xml">research</a> showing that primates, as well as many other tree-dwelling species, accept man-made canopy bridges as a means to cross gaps in their habitat. </p>
<p>In South Africa we conducted an <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0006320719319172">experiment in the field</a> to test what kind of canopy bridge primates would use to cross gaps between trees. We found that all five South African primate species used the canopy bridges offered to them. The design they preferred was a solid pole bridge, rather than a ladder bridge. </p>
<p>More and more canopy bridges of various kinds are being provided in different countries. But <a href="https://brill.com/view/journals/ijfp/93/3-6/article-p197_1.xml">research</a> shows that Africa is lagging behind other continents in doing this, and there are no canopy bridges in South Africa. We suggest that all infrastructure development projects should try to give attention to maintaining the integrity of landscapes, for example by providing bridges for animals.</p>
<h2>Public participation</h2>
<p>We all need and use linear infrastructure in our day to day lives, so we all carry some level of responsibility. Hence, we encourage people to record wildlife mortalities and submit them to publicly available repositories such as <a href="https://www.inaturalist.org/">iNaturalist</a> or the <a href="https://www.gbif.org/">Global Biodiversity Information Facility</a>. </p>
<p>A new <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2076-2615/13/10/1692">Global Primate Roadkill Database</a> has been developed by Laura Praill at Oxford Brookes University and colleagues and is <a href="https://gprd.mystrikingly.com/">available to the public</a>.</p>
<p>Public awareness and participation is essential to lessen the human impact on biodiversity.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200554/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Birthe (Bibi) Linden is affiliated with the SARChI Chair on Biodiversity Value and Change in the Faculty of Science, Engineering and Agriculture at the University of Venda and the Lajuma Resesarch Centre. She receives funding from the South African National Research Foundation (NRF).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Wendy Collinson is affiliated with The Endangered Wildlife Trust and the South African Research Chair in Biodiversity Value & Change, School of Mathematical and Natural Sciences, University of Venda, Thohoyandou, South Africa. She is also a member of the IUCN: Transport Working Group.</span></em></p>Researchers encourage citizen scientists to contribute to datasets on animal deaths caused by infrastructure. This will inform efforts to reduce the human impact on biodiversity.Birthe (Bibi) Linden, Postdoctoral Researcher (University of Venda) & Associated Researcher (Lajuma Research Centre), University of VendaWendy Collinson, Research Fellow: South African Research Chair in Biodiversity Value & Change, University of VendaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1974512023-01-11T12:32:49Z2023-01-11T12:32:49ZUK strikes: what ongoing industrial action means for the future of Britain’s railways<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/503661/original/file-20230109-9211-v5fwqn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=20%2C55%2C977%2C558&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">All aboard. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/london-train-tube-station-blur-people-218504053">alice-photo/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Rail unions and operators <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jan/09/rail-strikes-mick-lynch-unions-ministers">have been meeting</a> with the government to attempt to break an industrial action deadlock that, according to Network Rail, has lost the industry more than £400m in revenue since last summer.</p>
<p>Workers for UK rail companies have been striking for months over pay and conditions, but the resulting difficulties are impacting the future development of Britain’s rail industry. It was already experiencing growing customer expectations, increased environmental challenges and a need for more capacity. But, <a href="https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/news/2022/issues-facing-uk-rail-industry-not-new">as I wrote last year</a>, some working practices have not kept pace with these demands making it difficult to innovate to meet these needs.</p>
<p>But by letting companies and workers find ways to meet changing transportation needs, Britain’s railways could benefit from greater innovation without significantly increasing costs for consumers. In this sense, the government would be wise to take a new, more hands-off approach to the rail industry.</p>
<p>Following the COVID-19 lockdowns, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0965856421002391">travel patterns appear to have changed</a> forever, accelerating a previously glacial <a href="https://www.cipd.co.uk/Images/employee-outlook-focus-on-commuting-and-flexible-working_tcm18-10886.pdf">shift to flexible working</a>. And now, with <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1002166/rail-environment-policy-statement.pdf">emissions reduction</a> becoming increasingly important, and the continued <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/topics/cljev4jz3pjt">cost of living crisis</a> causing people to think very carefully about how to spend their money, an effective railway system is needed more than ever. The rail industry needs to adapt to meet this need. </p>
<p>While the number of people travelling by train has <a href="https://www.railadvent.co.uk/2022/07/rail-passenger-numbers-over-90-of-pre-pandemic-levels.html">nearly returned to pre-COVID levels</a>, rail <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/5ebe226e-ea47-4d8a-b587-3d255faa1220">revenues are still down</a>, which is compounding longer term affordability challenges for railway operators. Customers are now suffering severe disruption from strikes, but there is <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/ap-steve-barclay-london-nurses-rishi-sunak-b2258559.html">little sign of the kind of agreement</a> on changes to working practices needed to resolve this issue. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-08/mini-budget-disaster-is-still-hurting-uk-economy-say-businesses">disastrous state</a> of public finances means tough choices must be made when spending taxpayer money. The Treasury is unlikely to look favourably at rail while the challenges around updated working practices are not being addressed. This means rail projects risk being cut or completed on the cheap, while services or entire lines could be closed. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Passenger train passing through british countryside with mountains and town in distance." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/503646/original/file-20230109-9360-y1y6hy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C22%2C992%2C642&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/503646/original/file-20230109-9360-y1y6hy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/503646/original/file-20230109-9360-y1y6hy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/503646/original/file-20230109-9360-y1y6hy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/503646/original/file-20230109-9360-y1y6hy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/503646/original/file-20230109-9360-y1y6hy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/503646/original/file-20230109-9360-y1y6hy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rail demand has nearly returned to pre-COVID levels, but revenues are still down.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/passenger-train-passing-through-british-countryside-642770650">SAKhanPhotography/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>UK rail strikes: pay and conditions</h2>
<p>So how does recent industrial action figure into the current situation? Everyone wants their pay to at least to keep up with inflation, but most rail staff are <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jun/23/railworkers-and-what-they-earn-who-are-the-real-fat-cats">relatively well paid</a> and other public service workers such as nurses may be seen as even more deserving. </p>
<p>Plus, it could be argued that taxpayer money should only be used to pay more to rail workers if there are improvements in efficiency, but unions are preventing some of this much needed change. </p>
<p>For example, if rail staff could be contracted to work at weekends <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2022/03/16/rail-staff-forced-work-weekends-bid-boost-train-travel/#:%7E:text=Tens%20of%20thousands%20of%20railway,an%20industry%20conference%20in%20London.">instead of doing so as voluntary overtime</a>, services could be properly planned and resourced for a seven-day railway without anyone being paid less or working more. Similarly, the removal of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jun/21/uk-rail-strikes-the-truth-behind-the-claims-and-counter-claims#:%7E:text=Has%20the%20RMT%20stopped%20modernisation%2C%20as%20management%20claims%3F">blockages to modernisation</a> and new technology, such as drones for remote monitoring, could help improve reliability, workforce safety and efficiency without the need for compulsory redundancies. </p>
<p>But while the industry needs to be held to account for improvements, rail businesses need to be able to make changes to better serve customers and taxpayers. An end to strikes, combined with progress on these long-standing issues, would help restore general confidence about investing in rail. It could also enable employment of more customer-facing staff and investment in skills, hopefully making rail travel more inclusive and a better experience for everyone.</p>
<p>To do this, there is a need for fundamental reform of how the UK government contracts with train operators. Even before the pandemic, the government had become far too involved in the detail running of the railway including <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/rail-timetabling">timetabling decisions</a>.</p>
<p>This stifles innovation and makes it increasingly difficult for the industry to collaborate to deliver great customer experience at an affordable price. And while emergency financial measures were clearly needed to keep the railway running as a result of the pandemic, this has brought the government even further into daily management of railways.</p>
<h2>Rail review</h2>
<p>A sweeping review of Britain’s railways <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-announces-root-and-branch-review-of-rail">launched in 2018</a> recommended creating a new “<a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/future-of-britains-railways-williams-shapps-plan-for-rail">guiding mind</a>” state body called Great British Railways that would sit at arm’s length from government and work with the private sector. It would oversee strategy by bringing together track and train, putting customers at the heart of decision-making and owning the long-term vision for UK rail. The plan was to provide clear accountability for the whole railway and enable politicians to set objectives but step away from the detail. </p>
<p>The review started over four years ago and it’s nearly two years since <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/future-of-britains-railways-williams-shapps-plan-for-rail">the delayed publication of its conclusions</a>, including the proposal to create Great British Railways. So far, <a href="https://gbrtt.co.uk/">the team</a> has been set up to drive these reforms and create the guiding mind that would enable the government to step away from running Britain’s railways. </p>
<p>Some key issues identified in the review were also acknowledged by the subsequent government report such as the need for clear focus on customers, strong regional businesses focused on delivery, and the opportunity to unleash the potential for the private sector. But simplification of rail travel for customers is also needed, as well as a focus on the entirety of the industry’s finances, not just cost cutting.</p>
<p>It would be perverse for the government to decide that it should step out of day-to-day railway operations but then go on to be very involved in the detail of designing Great British Railways. Instead its role should be to set the key objectives and the framework, and then hold this new guiding mind to account for developing the detail. </p>
<p>As with previous rail reforms, progress could be made quickly in shadow mode (before legislation is passed) if the government is clear about the direction of travel. Hopefully the Rishi Sunak’s government will recommit to such reform and let Great British Railways get on with the detail.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/197451/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Professor Paul Plummer has previously worked in the railway and receives funding for research from parts of the railway.</span></em></p>After engaging with the rail unions, the government should be more hands off when it comes to UK rail.Paul Plummer, Professor in Rail Strategy, University of BirminghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1946492022-11-30T11:28:05Z2022-11-30T11:28:05ZThe days of the hydrogen car are already over<p><a href="https://www.hydrogen.energy.gov/pdfs/brochure.pdf">Hydrogen fuel cell cars</a> emerged as an alternative to both the electric and combustion engine vehicle in the early 2000s. They were widely considered an avenue towards universal green motoring. Powered through a chemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen, the only tailpipe emission they produce is water. </p>
<p>The technology also promised a traditional driving experience. Drivers can refuel at filling stations and the range of a hydrogen car is comparable to the combustion engine vehicle. Hydrogen vehicle technology also offered oil companies the opportunity to shift their operations towards the production and transportation of hydrogen and hydrogen refuelling at existing stations. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-launches-2-million-competition-to-promote-roll-out-of-hydrogen-fuelled-fleet-vehicles">UK government</a> reiterated its commitment to the technology in 2016 by investing £2 million in the promotion of hydrogen cars to UK businesses. The European Parliament have more recently agreed to set <a href="https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20221014IPR43206/car-recharging-stations-should-be-available-every-60-km-say-meps">minimum national targets</a> for the deployment of alternative fuels infrastructure. Under this framework, there will be at least one hydrogen refuelling station every 100km along main EU roads.</p>
<p>But hydrogen cars have now all but disappeared. Toyota and Hyundai, the only vehicle manufacturers to produce hydrogen cars for the UK market, sold just <a href="https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/business-environment-and-energy/why-hydrogen-no-longer-fuel-future">12 hydrogen cars</a> in the country in 2021. Earlier this year, <a href="https://www.electrive.com/2022/10/18/shell-quietly-closes-all-hydrogen-filling-stations-in-the-uk/">Shell closed</a> all of its UK Hydrogen refuelling stations. </p>
<p>Meanwhile electric vehicles, despite not delivering the range or the fast refuelling of a hydrogen car, have surged in popularity. In 2010, <a href="https://www.smmt.co.uk/2012/01/december-2011-ev-and-afv-registrations/">138 electric vehicles</a> were sold in the UK. This grew to roughly <a href="https://www.smmt.co.uk/2022/01/covid-stalls-2021-uk-new-car-market-but-record-ev-sales-show-future-direction/">190,000</a> annual sales in 2021.</p>
<h2>Infrastructure is key</h2>
<p>The vehicle types are not competing with each other outright. Instead, this is a case of competition between national technology systems. And where this is the case, the technically superior product rarely triumphs.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497353/original/file-20221125-7303-wo6gbb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A person choosing between VHS tape recorder options." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497353/original/file-20221125-7303-wo6gbb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497353/original/file-20221125-7303-wo6gbb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497353/original/file-20221125-7303-wo6gbb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497353/original/file-20221125-7303-wo6gbb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497353/original/file-20221125-7303-wo6gbb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497353/original/file-20221125-7303-wo6gbb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497353/original/file-20221125-7303-wo6gbb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">VHS video cassette tapes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/close-hand-chooses-video-cassette-tape-2192207673">Eakrin Rasadonyindee/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Betamax tape recorder failed to take control of the video cassette market in the 1980s, despite being technically superior to its competitors. The lower-quality video home system (VHS) was able to take a dominant share of the market due to their better supply chain infrastructure. As they were <a href="https://www.cnet.com/tech/computing/format-wars-the-tech-that-should-have-won/">stocked</a> in more video rental stores, VHS tapes were simply more accessible than Betamax.</p>
<p>Hydrogen and electric vehicles also depend on broader technological systems. One is based on electricity generation and the other on supplying hydrogen.</p>
<p>Electric vehicles have the advantage of being able to depend on an existing power generation and distribution system – the electrical grid. An electric vehicle can be recharged wherever there is access to a plug socket. </p>
<p>Electric vehicle manufacturer, Tesla, has capitalised on this. Already with a customer base, Tesla was able to build its vehicles and recharging infrastructure simultaneously. They <a href="https://ir.tesla.com/press-release/tesla-q4-2021-vehicle-production-deliveries">produced</a> over 900,000 new vehicles in 2021 and have installed a global fast charging network of <a href="https://www.tesla.com/en_gb/supercharger">35,000 superchargers</a> to support them.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497343/original/file-20221125-14-vlv0lk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A white Tesla parked at a Tesla fast charging point." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497343/original/file-20221125-14-vlv0lk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497343/original/file-20221125-14-vlv0lk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497343/original/file-20221125-14-vlv0lk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497343/original/file-20221125-14-vlv0lk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497343/original/file-20221125-14-vlv0lk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497343/original/file-20221125-14-vlv0lk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497343/original/file-20221125-14-vlv0lk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tesla have invested in a global fast charging network.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/calgary-alberta-canada-august-23rd-2019-1494953336">canadianPhotographer56/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The infrastructure that exists to support hydrogen vehicles is limited in comparison and will require extensive investment to introduce. The pipeline infrastructure necessary for a European hydrogen distribution system alone is estimated to cost <a href="https://gasforclimate2050.eu/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/EHB-A-European-hydrogen-infrastructure-vision-covering-28-countries.pdf">€80–143 billion</a> (£69–123 billion).</p>
<p>As hydrogen needs to be pressurised and transported either as a gas or a liquid, supply chains must also be redesigned. The cost of developing hydrogen refuelling stations and scaling up hydrogen production will also be extensive. Hydrogen production currently accounts for just <a href="https://www.irena.org/Energy-Transition/Technology/Hydrogen">3% of global energy demand</a>.</p>
<p>But governments and businesses are at present unwilling to make the required investments. There is little economic sense in building the infrastructure if the network of cars is too small to use it. Yet at the same time demand for hydrogen cars will remain low until they are supported with compatible infrastructure.</p>
<h2>Lessons for the hydrogen car</h2>
<p>The introduction of complex technologies and infrastructures have always relied on investment in large scale technology systems. But governments face a choice over which technologies they support.</p>
<p>Investment in technologies to bring public transport systems to cities in developed nations at the turn of the 20th century, to fight wars, and to power modern economies all emerged at a time when <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/139463">governments took responsibility</a> for the need to invest, plan and control production and consumption in the national interest.</p>
<p>Large scale national infrastructure projects including <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/resrep32432#metadata_info_tab_contents">nuclear power</a> and weapons programmes, rail electrification, the development of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2013/sep/09/how-we-made-intercity-125">high-speed trains</a> and <a href="https://www.fai.org/page/icare-history-pioneers">manned space missions</a> all occurred throughout the remainder of the century. They all required coordinated efforts to bring them about. This involved government funding, the creation of new institutions such as Nasa and British Rail, research grants for manufacturers, and <a href="https://history.nasa.gov/moondec.html">the setting of clear targets</a>. </p>
<p>Governments have also been the customers of these technologies. The US government, for example, <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/elon-musks-spacex-wins-us-military-national-security-mission-contract-12047614">awarded</a> Elon Musk’s space technology programme, SpaceX, a contract to conduct national security launches for the US military.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497344/original/file-20221125-26-h9hr74.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A train passing through a station at speed." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497344/original/file-20221125-26-h9hr74.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497344/original/file-20221125-26-h9hr74.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497344/original/file-20221125-26-h9hr74.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497344/original/file-20221125-26-h9hr74.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497344/original/file-20221125-26-h9hr74.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497344/original/file-20221125-26-h9hr74.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/497344/original/file-20221125-26-h9hr74.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">High-speed rail was introduced to the UK in 1976.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/british-high-speed-passenger-train-passing-60627334">Gary Blakeley/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The planning and construction of such systems have always been underpinned by the idea that national interests are at stake. This has been the case whether the motive has been to ensure adequate military defences, to be internationally competitive or to provide societal benefits by launching satellites and developing mass public transport systems.</p>
<p>A mixed automotive economy of hydrogen and electric vehicles could accelerate the transition towards zero emissions. But a viable hydrogen automotive system will need investment on a massive scale. It will require the construction of new and complex technology systems and a fundamental shift in policy thinking and public discourse.</p>
<hr>
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<img alt="Imagine weekly climate newsletter" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tom Stacey receives funding from ERDF. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chris Ivory receives funding from ERDF, FORTE (Sweden).</span></em></p>Hydrogen cars were heralded as an avenue towards universal green motoring, but progress has stalled in recent years.Tom Stacey, Senior Lecturer in Operations and Supply Chain Management, Anglia Ruskin UniversityChris Ivory, Director of the Innovative Management Practice Research Centre, Anglia Ruskin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1907952022-09-27T13:12:01Z2022-09-27T13:12:01ZNorthern Ghana is underdeveloped because of underinvestment during colonial rule, not geography<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/485351/original/file-20220919-7117-csy9xg.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Northern Ghana was treated as a periphery outpost by colonial administrators.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Flickr</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ghana’s most important development problem is arguably the disparity between the north and south of the country. The north is acutely underdeveloped, trailing the south in practically all metrics of development.</p>
<p>Several inequality <a href="https://www.unicef.org/ghana/media/531/file/The%20Ghana%20Poverty%20and%20Inequality%20Report.pdf">reports</a> have consistently labelled the northern region as one of concern. Its rate of poverty level decline has remained very slow: from a poverty rate of 55.7% in 2006 to 50.4% in 2012. Southern Ghana enjoys a <a href="https://www.undp.org/ghana/publications/ghanas-multidimensional-poverty-index-report">lower poverty incidence</a> at 45%.</p>
<p>Explanations for the underdevelopment of the north often underscore its geography and climate. The north is dry, unsuited to growing cash crops, and lacking mineral resources. Another school of thought considers the impact of the colonial experience from 1897 till independence. The north was sidelined by the British colonial administration.</p>
<p>I have been looking into this to see which kind of explanation is most satisfactory. My <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00220388.2022.2113066">study</a> of the economic history of Ghana specifically examines the colonial roots of the north-south development divide. </p>
<p>I estimated the current development disparity between the two regions and examined the contribution of colonial public investments in education, health and infrastructure. The south received almost all the colonial public investments. </p>
<p>I found that the effects of past colonial investments persist now – even in the few northern locations where they were made. They still strongly determine current development outcomes in Ghana. </p>
<p>The findings suggest that colonial investments were equally productive in the north and the south. The current status of the north would be different had it received a fairer share of colonial investments. The findings also suggest how development could be achieved in future.</p>
<h2>Ghana’s north and south contrasted</h2>
<p>I found that an average location in the north is at least 51% less developed than one in the south. The level of development was based on satellite images of light density at night – a precise and objective measure.</p>
<p>More than 70% of the northern population live in disadvantaged rural areas. The region <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/272325050_The_Contours_of_Poverty_in_Northern_Ghana_Policy_Implications_for_Combating_Food_Insecurity">scores lower</a> than the south in most development terms. For example, in the Greater Accra Region, 22.5% of the population is poor in several ways, according to the <a href="https://www.undp.org/sites/g/files/zskgke326/files/migration/gh/UNDP_GH_MPI_Report_2020.pdf">UNDP’s 2020 Inequality Report</a>. </p>
<p>The arid north is primarily savannah woodland with no significant potential for cash crop cultivation. The mineral-rich and wetter south, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00220388.2022.2113066">covering about 56%</a> of the country, produces and exports cash crops. The population of the south (24.5 million) is four times that of the north.</p>
<p>Other arguments about the regional differences concern their history. It’s said that prior to colonial conquests, the north was more prosperous and developed, having built a fortune on trade and industry. That changed through colonial practices. The colonial state administered the north as a “periphery” and the south as a “core”. Colonial investments and expenditures in the north were kept at a bare minimum.</p>
<p>I explored the spatial distribution of colonial public investments in education, health and infrastructure. For example, northern Ghana had no class one road as at 1931 and no railway throughout the colonial period. Average distances to a colonial railroad were 324km and 59km for northern and southern areas respectively. The average distance to a class one road in 1931 was about 196km in the north and 32km in the south. </p>
<p>Colonial investments, railways in particular, stimulated local economic activities and development in the south. </p>
<p>In 1901 the north had no school or hospital. The south had 125 schools and eight places with at least one hospital. By 1931 the number of schools in the south had risen to 325 and places with hospitals to 24. But the number of schools in the north had only doubled to eight, and only six places had at least one hospital.</p>
<h2>Colonial effects persist</h2>
<p>I found that past colonial investments still strongly determine contemporary development in Ghana. Places closer to locations of past colonial investments are still relatively more developed today. </p>
<p>Even though the north received far fewer colonial investments, areas closer to the locations of colonial investments in the north are more developed today than other areas in the north. So colonial investments were equally productive in the north. </p>
<p>Current development outcomes in Ghana are also more heavily driven by colonial-era factors than by post-independence factors. </p>
<p>There are several reasons why the effects of past colonial investments persist.</p>
<p>First, once an investment had been made in a location, subsequent investments followed in the same location. It would be more cost-effective or more convenient to extend an existing railway line, for example, than to survey unexplored terrain for new railway lines. </p>
<p>Second, colonial investments brought associated benefits, prolonging their effects. If railway lines stimulated population growth in an area, more health facilities and schools would be provided. </p>
<p>Third, colonial investments like railway lines, schools and hospitals had a long physical duration. </p>
<p>Fourth, colonial investments had high returns because they were made in places that had not previously received such investments. </p>
<p>My study leads me to conclude that if more investments had been made in the north, the region could today be more like the south in terms of development.</p>
<h2>Diagnosis of the problem</h2>
<p>There have been numerous programmes to develop the north since Ghana gained political independence in 1957. Unfortunately, most either underperformed or failed. This is because the potential of the north has not been properly diagnosed. </p>
<p>The north’s historical fortune was oriented towards trade and industry. At the onset of colonial rule, the modernisation of its trade system depended on the extension of railway lines to the region. But the north still has no railways connecting it to the south. Roads to the south are also in a deplorable condition. </p>
<p>Development policies in the north have targeted food production instead of infrastructural developments. But food production can’t transform the north without better transport links. </p>
<p>The construction of the <a href="https://new-ndpc-static1.s3.amazonaws.com/CACHES/PUBLICATIONS/2016/05/03/1-MASTER+PLAN+GHANA+FINAL+REPORT+-+Fin4.pdf">Ghana Railway Masterplan</a>, designed in 2013 to connect the north and the south, has not started. The mooted <a href="https://projectsportal.afdb.org/dataportal/VProject/show/P-GH-DB0-018">Eastern Corridor Road</a> project has never seen concrete progress either. These two projects would arguably be the most important routes to transform the north.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/190795/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Iddrisu Mohammed Kambala does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Ghana’s northern region would be more developed now had it received a fairer share of colonial investments.Iddrisu Mohammed Kambala, PhD Candidate, University of South CarolinaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1904172022-09-21T18:26:06Z2022-09-21T18:26:06ZWhy major Canadian railways must no longer be permitted to police themselves<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484762/original/file-20220915-4859-xugp6i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4000%2C2734&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A deadly train derailment that killed three workers is shown near Field, B.C., in February 2019. Railways have their own police forces that place them in a conflict of interest when they investigate their employers. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Major railways in Canada, alone among private sector corporations, <a href="https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/passifiume-time-to-re-examine-role-of-railway-police">have their own police forces</a> with full investigative and jurisdictional powers over accidents on, or near, their property. </p>
<p>These unique powers — a historic anomaly dating back to <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/timeline/railway-history">the 19th century when railways were being built across North America</a> — have, until recently, escaped public scrutiny. </p>
<p>Investigators answer to their own police chiefs at the railways, and ultimately to corporation executives, for whom profit and shareholder value are paramount. The <a href="https://digitalcommons.osgoode.yorku.ca/ohlj/vol49/iss1/4/">closest parallel is the military police</a> whose law enforcement investigations are not independent but accountable to their military command structures.</p>
<h2>CP Rail probe of B.C. crash</h2>
<p>Public awareness of the powers of railway police forces has grown in the wake of a runaway Canadian Pacific (CP) freight train crash near Field, B.C. in February 2019, <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/4922096/train-derailment-field-b-c/">killing three workers</a>. </p>
<p>The CP police investigation into the accident focused on the crew’s actions. It didn’t examine potential fault by the corporation. No details of the investigation findings were made public.</p>
<p>However, one of the CP police investigators assigned to the accident spoke out. <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/cp-derailment-investigation-coverup-alleged-1.5436018">Mark Tataryn told CBC’s <em>The Fifth Estate</em></a> that his superiors ordered him to stop investigating and prevented him from obtaining key records such as maintenance, safety and inspection reports. He alleged there was a coverup of potential negligence by the company. </p>
<p>Documents obtained by <em>The Fifth Estate</em> also revealed that CP Rail threatened the Transportation Safety Board (TSB) with a lawsuit after its lead investigator, Don Crawford, told <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/video-derailment-canadian-pacific-railway-field-1.5449758">CBC News</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“There is enough to suspect there’s negligence here, and it needs to be investigated by the proper authority.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The TSB <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/cp-railway-tsb-lawsuit-threat-investigator-field-fatal-derailment-1.6070183">removed Crawford from the investigation</a> on the grounds his statement was inappropriate since the TSB does not have the authority to determine criminality.</p>
<h2>TSB within its rights</h2>
<p>However, <a href="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/2323/MOU_Memorandum_of_Understanding_TSB_-_RCMP_Federal_-_Department_of_Royal_Canadian_Mounted_Police_%28EN%29_56_.pdf?1663778885">a memorandum of understanding between the RCMP and the TSB</a> signed in 2015 outlined a policy of referring to the RCMP “occurrences in which there are indications of possible criminal activity.” </p>
<p>That means the TSB was within its rights to refer the case to an authority that could investigate criminal liability. A 2020 amended version of the memorandum removed the reference to potential criminality. </p>
<p>Finally, in December 2020 — and only after intense media attention and complaints from the dead crew’s family — <a href="https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/rcmp-start-criminal-investigation-into-train-derailment-near-field-b-c-1.5236157">the RCMP opened a criminal investigation into the crash</a>, which is ongoing. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-defendants-deny-claims-of-wrongdoing-in-fatal-bc-train-derailment/">CP executives and police continue to deny any wrongdoing.</a></p>
<p><a href="https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/R-4.2/section-44.html">Canada’s Railway Safety Act</a> is silent on how Canadian railway police should be governed and who is their ultimate boss. But they should be governed first and foremost by the law and their duty to uphold the public interest. </p>
<p>However, the law is murky. Railway police forces are paid by the corporation, giving its CEO ultimate control. That means the railway police chiefs follow corporate directives. </p>
<p>Presumably, this would also apply to CN and CP police chiefs operating in the United States, who, while not commissioned police officers in any American state, are ultimately accountable to corporate CEOs based in Canada.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A huge cloud of smoke billows at the end of gleaming black rail cars." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484872/original/file-20220915-8999-r2x3f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/484872/original/file-20220915-8999-r2x3f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484872/original/file-20220915-8999-r2x3f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484872/original/file-20220915-8999-r2x3f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484872/original/file-20220915-8999-r2x3f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484872/original/file-20220915-8999-r2x3f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/484872/original/file-20220915-8999-r2x3f5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Smoke billows up from a derailed Canadian Pacific Railway train near Guernsey, Sask., in February 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Matt Smith</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Situation comparable in the U.S.</h2>
<p>U.S. railway policing powers, also dating back to the 19th century, are broadly comparable to those of their Canadian counterparts. The U.S. has a <a href="http://www.therailroadpolice.com/p-r-police-laws">state-based system</a>, with most states having similar levels of railway police powers. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/49/28101">American federal government has a modest degree of oversight legislation</a> in place. But U.S. railway police forces answer to the chief security officer of the corporation, whose specific job description prioritizes protecting the corporation and its reputation.</p>
<p>However, several sources have indicated to me that this practice has existed for so long that it has most likely slipped under the radar of American authorities. They have likely not considered the implications of CN and CP police chiefs — and indirectly their corporate bosses — exercising police powers in the U.S. </p>
<p>This relationship has recently gained public attention because of <a href="https://www.realagriculture.com/2021/12/cp-rail-completes-acquisition-of-kansas-city-southern-with-integration-pending-u-s-regulator-approval/">CP’s pending takeover of Kansas City Southern</a>, which is currently under review by the U.S. Surface Transportation Board.</p>
<h2>Calls for action</h2>
<p>The CP investigation into the Field, B.C. crash and other railway accidents have led to demands — from within government itself, railway unions and the public — to dismantle existing railway police powers. </p>
<p>A recent House of Commons <a href="https://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/44-1/TRAN/report-5/page-ToC">Transport and Infrastructure Committee report</a> recommended eliminating company policing power provisions from the Railway Safety Act to avert potential conflict of interest when private railway police investigate their own companies.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6796195-Teamsters-Call-for-Independent-Police.html">Teamsters Canada Rail Conference</a>, Canada’s largest railway union, is calling for the total abolition of railway police.</p>
<p>Several <a href="https://petitions.ourcommons.ca/en/Petition/Details?Petition=e-3984">parliamentary petitions</a>, including one filed by the mother of one of the Field victims, are calling for existing railway police to be brought under one independent public railway police regime, funded by the companies and accountable to an independent civilian oversight commission, similar to the <a href="https://www.orr.gov.uk/about/who-we-work-with/safety-bodies/british-transport-police">British system</a>. </p>
<p>The families are also <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/cp-rail-lawsuits-victims-fatal-derailment-1.5991122">suing CP Rail and Transport Canada.</a></p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1461260909863710720"}"></div></p>
<p>The government was obliged to respond to the parliamentary petitions after Parliament resumed on Sept. 19, 2022. But so far the prime minister, the attorney general and the transport minister have yet to address calls for railway policing reform. </p>
<p>Under current railway police powers, the families of dead railway workers are left with no answers and no accountability. Railway corporations are never properly investigated, let alone held to account for failings that contribute to these industrial workplace tragedies.</p>
<p>The time to act is long overdue. The federal government must replace this antiquated relic with a railway policing law that helps restore public confidence in law enforcement and provides justice to victims’ families.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/190417/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bruce Campbell is affiliated with. Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Group of 78, Rideau Institute for International Affairs, Polaris institute</span></em></p>The federal government must implement a railway policing law that helps restore public confidence in law enforcement and provides justice to the families of those who die on the job.Bruce Campbell, Adjunct Professor, Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1882102022-08-15T20:04:31Z2022-08-15T20:04:31ZCosts of Sydney’s driverless train conversion outweigh the benefits<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/479092/original/file-20220815-485-8q5rsz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C149%2C998%2C516&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The NSW government’s industrial dispute with rail unions over the new intercity trains is tipped to add <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/train-dispute-risks-246m-cost-blowout-for-sydney-metro-20220704-p5ayzi.html">hundreds of millions of dollars</a> to costs on Australia’s largest infrastructure project that has already blown out by billions.</p>
<p>But even without overruns pushing the cost of the driverless-train project to <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/expensive-feast-at-15-million-a-day-sydney-s-mega-rail-projects-hit-costly-speed-bumps-20220804-p5b770.html">more than A$55 billion</a>, the economics of the “Sydney Metro” project are questionable – in particular the decision to cannibalise parts of the existing Sydney train network to create one of the four planned automated routes.</p>
<p>The new driverless trains – as used in megacities throughout the world – have fewer seats, increased standing room, and more doors than Sydney’s main fleet of double-decker trains, making them better suited to peak-time congestion. </p>
<p>The Metro project promises to deliver up to 15 services an hour (every four minutes) to cope with Sydney’s growing population.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A driverless train in Bangkok, Thailand." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/478193/original/file-20220809-20-p1hk56.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/478193/original/file-20220809-20-p1hk56.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478193/original/file-20220809-20-p1hk56.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478193/original/file-20220809-20-p1hk56.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478193/original/file-20220809-20-p1hk56.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478193/original/file-20220809-20-p1hk56.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478193/original/file-20220809-20-p1hk56.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A driverless train in Bangkok, Thailand.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Driverless trains will eventually operate on three lines from the CBD (to the northwest, west and southwest) and one in far-western Sydney, connecting to the city’s second airport site at Badgery’s Creek. </p>
<p>By far the biggest cost for the project are new tunnels under the harbour and CBD. Our focus, however, is on the merits of cannibalising existing rail infrastructure – namely the rail line to Bankstown, about 16km southwest of the Sydney CBD – for the southwest Metro line. </p>
<p>This part of the project involves converting 11 stations between Bankstown and the inner-eastern suburb of Sydenham. (A new tunnel has been built from Sydenham into the CBD, where the line links to the Northwest Metro line.) </p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/478234/original/file-20220809-14-mvpk1f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/478234/original/file-20220809-14-mvpk1f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478234/original/file-20220809-14-mvpk1f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478234/original/file-20220809-14-mvpk1f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478234/original/file-20220809-14-mvpk1f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478234/original/file-20220809-14-mvpk1f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/478234/original/file-20220809-14-mvpk1f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Sydney Railway System.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">The authors</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<hr>
<p>Our analysis shows the costs, disruptions and lost opportunities associated with converting this line for the Metro network outweigh the benefits and potential savings, largely achieved from replacing drivers.</p>
<h2>Straightening the line</h2>
<p>Automated trains are now commonplace in cities throughout Asia, Europe and the Middle East. Their high-frequency services and platform screen doors enable the transport of large numbers of commuters with minimal staff supervision. They have proven safe and effective. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/five-innovations-that-could-shape-the-future-of-rail-travel-147962">Five innovations that could shape the future of rail travel</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The issue is whether they are worth cannibalising existing services for. There are two main calculations to consider: the initial cost; and the ongoing costs.</p>
<p>In terms of initial costs, the Bankstown line is not well-suited for automatic trains. Automatic trains, which stop precisely at gateways on enclosed platforms, require straight platforms. The Bankstown line, and five of its station platforms, are sharply curved.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Straightening up: the curved platform of Campsie train station, on the Bankstown line in south-western Sydney, is being converted for automatic trains as part the NSW government's Sydney Metro rail project." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/479073/original/file-20220815-51451-e51hsv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/479073/original/file-20220815-51451-e51hsv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479073/original/file-20220815-51451-e51hsv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479073/original/file-20220815-51451-e51hsv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479073/original/file-20220815-51451-e51hsv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=479&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479073/original/file-20220815-51451-e51hsv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=479&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/479073/original/file-20220815-51451-e51hsv.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=479&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Straightening up: the curved platform of Campsie train station, on the Bankstown line in south-western Sydney, is being converted for automatic trains as part the NSW government’s Sydney Metro rail project.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Campsie_station.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Calculating the full cost of making these right for driverless trains is complicated, because maintenance and renovations to improve accessibility and amenity would have happened in any circumstance.</p>
<p>Based on the NSW government’s <a href="https://infrastructurepipeline.org/project/sydney-metro#:%7E:text=The%20Sydney%20Metro%20City%20%26%20Southwest%20project%20cost,used%20for%20the%20%248.3%20billion%20Sydney%20Metro%20Northwest">public announcements</a>, we estimate converting the line and stations to driverless trains will cost about A$1 billion. We conservatively estimate $500 million of that is purely to meet the operating requirements of driverless trains. This excludes the cost of new train storage, control systems and power upgrades specifically incurred by the choice of automated trains. </p>
<h2>Savings on drivers</h2>
<p>On the other side of the ledger are potential savings – notably on driver costs. We estimate operating the Bankstown railway as an automated metro will save about $15 million a year on driver costs. </p>
<p>This is based on the driver cost of providing train services at least every 10 minutes all week, and every five minutes during peak times. The NSW government has indicated Metro services will operate up to every <a href="https://www.sydneymetro.info/citysouthwest/sydenham-bankstown">four minutes</a>, but the timetable for the Bankstown line metro is not yet public.</p>
<p>We estimated driver costs based on the May 2022 <a href="https://transportnsw.info/documents/timetables/93-T3-Bankstown-Line-20220219.pdf">timetable</a> for the Bankstown line – about 1,500 services a week (1,210 during the week, and 324 at weekends). To approximate matching the higher frequency promised by the Metro trains, we calculated driver costs for 1,900 services a week. </p>
<p>This would require employing about 100 drivers, allowing for normal working hours, holidays and other leave. Based on the cost of employing a driver, including administrative overheads, being about <a href="https://au.jora.com/s?sp=salary_search&q=Train+Driver&l=Sydney">$150,000</a> a year, the savings from replacing drivers on this line is about $15 million a year.</p>
<p>Assuming a 5% rate of <a href="https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/FlagPost/2018/October/Discount-rates">return</a> on the $500 million cost to automate the line, this saving is offset by the $25 million a year in opportunity costs on the $500 million line conversion. </p>
<h2>Time for a rethink</h2>
<p>Augmenting established rail networks with new automated rail services is one thing. Cannibalising existing infrastructure to build those new lines is quite another. </p>
<p>Fortunately for taxpayers, the NSW government is not repeating this conversion approach with the other Metro lines. </p>
<p>By our calculation, Sydney would be better served by following the approach adopted in Melbourne and Brisbane. Both cities are investing heavily in new rail lines, but they are acquiring new trains compatible with their existing railway systems.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/nsw-on-a-slow-track-to-fast-trains-promised-regional-rail-upgrades-are-long-overdue-160932">NSW on a slow track to fast trains: promised regional rail upgrades are long overdue</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>This would make much more sense for the Metro line yet to be built between the CBD and the western-Sydney centre of Parramatta. </p>
<p>Greater compatibility will enable services to be readily extended onto existing tracks west of Parramatta while avoiding the cost and complexities of the Bankstown line conversion.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/188210/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher Day receives funding from the Commonwealth Government through a PhD scholarship.
The authors acknowledge the significant contribution to this research and article of Dick Day, general manager of timetabling and rail planning for Sydney Trains from 1990 to 2008. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rico Merkert does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The benefits of cannibalising Sydney’s rail network to introduce new driverless services is far from clear.Christopher Day, PhD Student, Economic and Industrial Policy, Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies, University of SydneyRico Merkert, Professsor in Transport and Supply Chain Management and Deputy Director, Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies (ITLS) at the University of Sydney Business School, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1871692022-08-04T03:54:03Z2022-08-04T03:54:03ZMore than ever, it’s time to upgrade the Sydney–Melbourne railway<p>It’s 14 years since former NSW rail chief Len Harper <a href="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/2232/CORE21_Laird.pdf?1659317321">described</a> the rail link between Australia’s two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, as “inadequate for current and future needs”. And it’s 31 years since former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam put the problem more bluntly during a TV interview: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>there are no cities in the world as close to each other with such large population as Sydney and Melbourne which are linked by so bad a railway.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Despite remedial work by the Australian Rail Track Corporation since it leased the NSW section of track, the rail link’s most serious problem – its “steam age” alignment – remains. </p>
<p>Is a new, dedicated, high-speed rail link the answer? The Labor government thinks so: among the plans <a href="https://www.gg.gov.au/about-governor-general/media/opening-first-session-forty-seventh-commonwealth-parliament-parliament-house-canberra">flagged</a> last week when Governor-General David Hurley opened parliament was a pledge to begin work on “nation-building projects like high-speed rail”.</p>
<p>That vision isn’t new. A high-speed rail link between Sydney and Melbourne – with trains operating at speeds of 250 kilometres per hour or more on their own track – was first proposed in 1984 by CSIRO. Since then, it has been examined in depth no fewer than three times, most recently in a <a href="https://apo.org.au/node/33517">report</a> released by the Gillard government in 2013.</p>
<p>After it lost government, Labor promoted the idea of a High Speed Rail Planning Authority. Infrastructure Australia <a href="https://www.infrastructureaustralia.gov.au/map/corridor-preservation-east-coasthigh-speed-rail">added its voice</a> in 2016 with a call for governments to start reserving land for a future high-speed rail link between Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.</p>
<p>The Coalition government preferred a less ambitious option. Its National Faster Rail Agency part-funded numerous studies assessing the viability of lifting speeds on the existing route to between 160 and 250 km per hour.</p>
<p>That approach could prove to be the best way forward, at least in the short to medium term. A high-speed link between Sydney and Melbourne might still be built, but it could take 20 years or more to begin operating. In the meantime, faster freight and passenger services are needed between Australia’s two largest cities if we are to meet our commitment to reducing carbon emissions from transport.</p>
<p>On average, according to Rail Futures <a href="https://www.railfutures.org.au/2017/07/submission-to-inquiry-into-national-freight-and-supply-chain-priorities">calculations</a>, rail freight is three times more energy efficient than road, and significantly more energy efficient than cars or planes in moving people.</p>
<h2>Limitations of the existing line</h2>
<p>Why has rail been losing ground to roads? The mainline track between Sydney and Melbourne – about 640 km of it in New South Wales and 320 km in Victoria – has many defects, some of which became <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/feb/24/victoria-train-derailmentdriver-wrote-of-faults-on-line-before-fatal-crash">more widely known</a> after the fatal derailment of an XPT in Victoria in February 2020.</p>
<p>Much of the track within New South Wales has a “steam age” alignment to ease grades, adding an extra 60 km to the journey. Far too many tight-radius curves slow down freight and passenger trains.</p>
<p>On the same TV program as Whitlam made that earlier remark, another former state rail chief, Ross Sayers, argued that a tilt train – a train designed to negotiate curves more quickly – could travel at more than 200 km per hour between Sydney and Melbourne on an upgraded alignment. “We could set the passenger transit time at five, or perhaps five and a half hours,” he said. This is still a good, viable option.</p>
<p>Five and a half hours would be half the time the current XPT services take. And the gain isn’t purely speculative: when Queensland straightened much of its track between Brisbane and Rockhampton for faster and heavier freight trains – and then, in 1998, introduced a new tilt train – passenger transit time halved from 14 to seven hours.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/477067/original/file-20220802-23-11xu44.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/477067/original/file-20220802-23-11xu44.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=363&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/477067/original/file-20220802-23-11xu44.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=363&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/477067/original/file-20220802-23-11xu44.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=363&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/477067/original/file-20220802-23-11xu44.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=456&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/477067/original/file-20220802-23-11xu44.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=456&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/477067/original/file-20220802-23-11xu44.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=456&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Long journey: a 2008 plan for higher speeds between Sydney and Melbourne. The Wagga Wagga bridge was completed in 2007 (as shown) and Southern Sydney Freight Bypass in 2013.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">From Railway Digest, February 2009</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>One major improvement to the Sydney–Melbourne line in recent decades was the installation in 2008 of centralised traffic control signalling, which allows for the remote control of points and signals along the track. Why the track between Australia’s two largest cities had to wait so long even for that upgrade, which was essential for efficient train operations, is a good question. New Zealand’s two largest cities, Auckland and Wellington, were linked by such signalling 42 years earlier, in 1966.</p>
<h2>The impact on freight and passengers…</h2>
<p>Fifty years ago, rail and road held roughly equal shares of the land freight moving between Sydney and Melbourne. Trucks took about 15 hours to traverse a two-lane Hume Highway that was poorly aligned in many places.</p>
<p>Mainly with funds from the federal government, the entire Hume Highway was subsequently rebuilt to modern engineering standards at a cost of about $20 billion in today’s terms. Much larger trucks can now move freight between Sydney and Melbourne in ten hours.</p>
<p>The pro-road policies don’t end there. Low road-access road pricing for trucks – an <a href="https://theconversation.com/trucks-are-destroying-our-roads-and-not-picking-up-the-repair-cost-79670">estimated hidden subsidy</a> of more than $8 per tonne – has combined with the substandard nature of the Sydney–Melbourne rail track to reduce rail’s share of palletised and containerised freight to <a href="https://pacificnational.com.au/australias-major-highway-now-a-conveyor-belt-for-big-trucks/">about 1%</a>, according to rail freight operator Pacific National. </p>
<p>The consequences include an increased risk of <a href="https://www.southernhighlandnews.com.au/story/7535357/hume-highway-lanes-re-openfollowing-fiery-two-truck-crash/">fatal</a> <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/fatal-crash-near-berrima-when-truck-goes-onwrong-side-of-hume-highway-20171014-gz0yn1.html">road crashes</a>, higher highway maintenance costs, pressure for more road upgrades, and increased emissions.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/transport-is-letting-australia-down-in-the-race-to-cut-emissions-131905">Transport is letting Australia down in the race to cut emissions</a>
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</em>
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<hr>
<p>A detailed 2001 track audit <a href="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/2232/CORE21_Laird.pdf?1659317321">identified</a> how 197 kilometres of new track built to modern engineering standards – including three major deviations from the existing alignment – could bypass 257 km of substandard track. Freight train transit times would then be reduced by nearly two hours.</p>
<p>I estimate that if rail were to regain a 50% share of the freight between our two largest cities, emissions would fall by over 300,000 tonnes per annum. In Australia, this is the equivalent of taking about 100,000 cars off the road.</p>
<p>As for freight, so for passengers. By 2019, more than nine million passengers were flying each year between Sydney and Melbourne, making this the <a href="https://www.oag.com/hubfs/Free_Reports/Busiest%20Routes/2019/busiest-routes-2019.pdf?hsCtaTracking=ee97d32f-97c9-4625-8a07-481cf63877c5%7C559f8381-6032-446d-9b62-6c16ff1f4bad">second-busiest</a> air corridor in the world. Tilt trains on upgraded track would speed the passenger journey appreciably while providing <a href="https://theconversation.com/nsw-on-a-slow-track-to-fast-trains-promised-regional-rail-upgrades-are-long-overdue-160932">long-overdue improvements</a> to rail services between Sydney and regional New South Wales and from Melbourne and Sydney to Canberra.</p>
<h2>… and on climate</h2>
<p>Along with improving resilience of the track to the impacts of climate change, if Australia is serious about decarbonisation, the effort must extend to transport. A significant portion of road freight and passengers will need to shift to rail. As the International Energy Agency <a href="https://www.iea.org/reports/net-zero-by-2050">noted</a> last year, “Rail transport is the most energy-efficient and least carbon-intensive way to move people and second only to shipping for carrying goods.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-labors-new-tax-cut-on-electric-vehicles-wont-help-you-buy-one-anytime-soon-187847">Why Labor's new tax cut on electric vehicles won't help you buy one anytime soon</a>
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</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The agency also stressed that “aviation growth will need to be constrained by comprehensive government policies that promote a shift towards rail” in order to achieve net-zero emissions.</p>
<p>If Australia fails to bring the Sydney–Melbourne track into the 21st century, we can expect not only excessive greenhouse gas emissions but also growing costs from many more trucks on the Hume Highway. Congestion at Melbourne and Sydney airports will worsen, and Australia will be left increasingly out of step with other countries in Europe, North America and Asia.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/187169/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Philip Laird owns shares in some transport companies and has received funding from the two rail-related CRCs as well as the ARC. He is affiliated, inter alia, with the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport, the Railway Technical Society of Australasia and the Rail Futures Institute. The opinions expressed are those of the author.</span></em></p>Improving the rail link between Australia’s two biggest cities will have many benefits, not least in meeting our carbon-reduction goalsPhilip Laird, Honorary Principal Fellow, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1872292022-07-19T13:10:38Z2022-07-19T13:10:38ZBritain isn’t built to withstand 40°C – here is where infrastructure is most likely to fail<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/474855/original/file-20220719-24-yfl95f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4594%2C3449&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/engineer-repairing-cables-on-telegraphic-pole-1358108471">KingTa/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Hot weather strains the pipes that pump our water, the power lines that deliver our energy and the roads and railways that get us home at night. As global temperatures continue to rise, national infrastructure will be challenged as never before.</p>
<p>Climate change is <a href="https://theconversation.com/climate-change-40-c-summer-temperatures-could-be-common-in-uk-by-2100-141479">intensifying heatwaves</a> in the UK, an affluent country with the capacity and resources to adapt to warmer temperatures. Still, <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-uk-is-so-unprepared-for-the-impacts-of-climate-change-162976">very little has been done</a> over the past ten years to address overheating in buildings and the rising risk to critical infrastructure. The country is unprepared to handle temperatures of more than 38°C consistently for long periods, which is more common in Mediterranean countries. </p>
<p>UK infrastructure has typically been designed to retain heat during the winter, but it must become effective at keeping the heat out in the summer. As things stand, <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1047003/climate-change-risk-assessment-2022.pdf">roughly 20%</a> of existing UK infrastructure is at risk of overheating – and this threat is projected to rise as average temperatures climb. </p>
<h2>Rail</h2>
<p>Railways <a href="https://www.networkrail.co.uk/campaigns/hot-weather-and-the-railway/">across the UK</a> contain thousands of miles of steel track. Steel has a high thermal conductivity, which means it can absorb and transfer a lot of heat faster than other construction materials, and reach up to 20°C hotter than the surrounding air temperature. Steel rails lengthen in the heat, pushing against the base and sides of the track. When there is no room to expand the rail can buckle, which takes a few days to repair and necessitates significant delays.</p>
<p>In hotter European countries, including Spain and France, the steel used in rail lines is typically treated differently before and during manufacture. For instance, different alloys made be used, or the steel may be fabricated differently so that it can release heat stress more effectively once deployed.</p>
<p>About <a href="https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN05907/SN05907.pdf">40%</a> of the British rail network is electrified, using both overhead lines and conductor rails. Power lines can sag in hot weather, so trains are ordered to travel at much slower speeds to prevent electrical fires. Slow journeys exert less force too, making it less likely the track will buckle.</p>
<p>Thankfully, modern overhead lines are less affected by hot weather as they contain auto-tension systems with springs or balance weights that adjust to varying temperatures. Older overhead power lines still contain fixed tension connectors to the trains and are much more vulnerable to failure during heatwaves – these must be replaced to prepare the UK’s rail network for hotter summers in future.</p>
<h2>Water</h2>
<p>Water pipes don’t just <a href="https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/giant-burst-pipe-in-heatwave-after-thames-water-urges-londoners-dont-waste-water/">burst or fracture</a> during the colder months of the year. As households consume more water during hot weather, water pressure in underground pipes rises. Meanwhile, parched soil can become loose and dry, allowing room for water pipes to shift, particular the bends, joints and connectors. When combined with high temperatures and UV rays on exposed parts of the network, pipes may burst. </p>
<p>Poorly maintained water pipes struggle to withstand long periods of hot temperatures, fluctuating pressure loads and inconsistent rainfall. Weak spots in pipelines are usually covered and insulated with polyethylene, a flexible plastic foamed insulator. </p>
<p>This ensures damage from overheating is limited, but more research is needed to make water utilities more resilient. In the meantime, the UK could expand the lifetime of its pipes by wrapping weak points more frequently and expanding the layer of protective material elsewhere.</p>
<h2>Electricity</h2>
<p>Hot weather can cause big problems for the networks which <a href="https://www.drax.com/power-generation/hot-weather-means-electricity/">generate and distribute electricity</a>. Power transmission cables in the UK are often clad in aluminium or rubber, which are susceptible to expanding in the heat. Power utilities will need to research alternative materials to help wires and electricity flexes withstand higher temperature variations.</p>
<p>The UK could also <a href="https://climate-adapt.eea.europa.eu/metadata/adaptation-options/adaptation-options-for-electricity-transmission-and-distribution-networks-and-infrastructure">install</a> conductors capable of working in hotter conditions and build taller power line poles.</p>
<p>Similar to the transmission cables for trains, electrical power lines expand and slacken in extreme temperatures, increasing resistance and lowering how efficiently the entire system distributes energy. A severe drop in efficiency can shut down power plants and plunge people trying to keep cool into a blackout. </p>
<p>Building a net zero country demands not only a transition to zero-carbon technologies, but adapting existing infrastructure to withstand the challenges of climate change. An economy capable of slowing and eventually reversing global heating can only emerge if we adapt what already exists to the inevitable impacts to come.</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Imagine weekly climate newsletter" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><strong><em>Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?</em></strong>
<br><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/imagine-57?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=Imagine&utm_content=DontHaveTimeTop">Get a weekly roundup in your inbox instead.</a> Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/imagine-57?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=Imagine&utm_content=DontHaveTimeBottom">Join the 10,000+ readers who’ve subscribed so far.</a></em></p>
<hr><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/187229/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kiran Tota-Maharaj does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>An expert assesses the weak links in a warming UK.Kiran Tota-Maharaj, Reader in Civil and Environmental Engineering, Aston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1826102022-05-16T14:54:18Z2022-05-16T14:54:18ZMombasa Port: how Kenya’s auditor-general misread China’s Standard Gauge Railway contracts<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/462433/original/file-20220511-14-o01aw4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A general view shows the Standard Gauge Railway train constructed by the Chinese Communications Construction Company and financed by Chinese government.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Simon Maina/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In December 2018, a <a href="https://twitter.com/johngithongo/status/1075187915875971072">leaked letter</a> from the Kenyan auditor-general’s office sparked a rumour that Kenya had staked its bustling Mombasa Port <a href="https://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/tea/business/mombasa-port-at-risk-as-audit-finds-it-was-used-to-secure-sgr-loan-1408886">as collateral</a> for the Chinese-financed Standard Gauge Railway. <a href="http://www.sais-cari.org/s/WP52-Brautigam-Bhalaki-Deron-Wang-How-Africa-Borrows-From-China.pdf">Our new research</a> shows why the collateral rumour is wrong.</p>
<p>The former auditor-general, Edward Ouko, was completing the <a href="https://www.oagkenya.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Kenya-Ports-Authority-2017-2018.pdf">2017/18 audit</a> of the national ports authority. He warned that the port authority’s assets – of which Mombasa Port is the most valuable – risked being taken over by China Eximbank if Kenya defaulted on the US$3.6 billion railway loans. </p>
<p>The profitable Mombasa Port is East Africa’s main international trade gateway. Launched in 2017, the railway was intended to seamlessly link the port to Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, and landlocked countries beyond.</p>
<p>The Kenyan fears mirrored another tale widely circulated earlier in 2018. In that story, China was said to have “seized” <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/25/world/asia/china-sri-lanka-port.html">Hambantota Port</a> in Sri Lanka when the island nation had trouble repaying Chinese loans. This “debt trap diplomacy” allegation was later shown <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2021/02/china-debt-trap-diplomacy/617953/">to be a myth</a>, but not before it sparked fears about other large Chinese projects. </p>
<p>The Chinese and Kenyan governments both denied that Mombasa Port was collateral but offered no explanation. Perplexed by the <a href="https://twitter.com/johngithongo/status/1075187915875971072">leaked letter</a>, our team of scholars and practitioners of international commercial law and project finance spent months collecting primary documents and mapping the project’s contractual structure. </p>
<p>To our surprise, we found that the collateral rumour stemmed from a seemingly tiny but critical misreading by the auditor-general. The chief auditor mistakenly labelled the ports authority as a borrower, responsible for repaying the Chinese railway loans. He charged that by waiving sovereign immunity, Kenya’s government had “<a href="https://www.oagkenya.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Kenya-Ports-Authority-2017-2018.pdf">expressly guaranteed</a>” that the ports authority’s assets could be used to repay the Chinese loan. The auditor-general was mistaken in both charges.</p>
<p>For the auditor-general, and many others, the debate over the railway and Mombasa Port was complicated by technical terms and practices. These are used routinely in the law and business of international project finance but are unfamiliar outside this arena. </p>
<p>Although some public education would have been necessary, releasing the contracts (which Kenya’s High Court ordered the government to do <a href="https://katibainstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Judgment-Pet-No-32-of-2021-Access-to-Information-pdf.pdf">just last week</a>) might have prevented the auditor-general’s mistake, and would have allowed debate on the facts, rather than rumours. </p>
<h2>Mapping the project</h2>
<p>The four key stakeholders in the financing of the Standard Gauge Railway were Kenya’s National Treasury (the borrower), the Kenya Railway Corporation (the project company), the Kenya Ports Authority and China Eximbank (the lender). The figure below maps the complicated contractual and payment arrangements.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/461749/original/file-20220506-26-hufbja.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Diagram" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/461749/original/file-20220506-26-hufbja.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/461749/original/file-20220506-26-hufbja.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/461749/original/file-20220506-26-hufbja.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/461749/original/file-20220506-26-hufbja.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=374&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/461749/original/file-20220506-26-hufbja.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/461749/original/file-20220506-26-hufbja.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/461749/original/file-20220506-26-hufbja.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=470&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">the complicated contractual and payment arrangements.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author supplied</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Kenya’s treasury explained the railway’s financing arrangements and credit enhancements in some <a href="https://africog.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Transport-Committee-FINAL-REPORT-ON-Standard-Gauge-Railway.pdf">detail</a> in a <a href="https://africog.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Transport-Committee-FINAL-REPORT-ON-Standard-Gauge-Railway.pdf">2013 briefing</a> to Kenya’s parliament. The government had arranged several credit enhancements to boost the financial attractiveness of the costly project, rendering it “bankable”. </p>
<p>Among these was a “take or pay” agreement signed between the national railway corporation and the ports authority. Under this 15 year agreement, the ports authority undertook to ship (or “take”) a minimum amount of cargo on the new railway every year. If cargo shipments dropped below the agreed annual level, Kenya Ports Authority would draw on its own revenues to cover (“pay”) the shortfall. </p>
<p>The ports authority is thus the Standard Gauge Railway’s major client, not its collateral. The treasury also pledged that the railway development levy, a 1.5% tax on Kenya’s imports, would <a href="https://africog.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Transport-Committee-FINAL-REPORT-ON-Standard-Gauge-Railway.pdf">support the project</a>.</p>
<h2>The mistakes</h2>
<p>One of our most important findings is that the government’s chief auditor was mistaken to call Kenya Ports Authority a borrower. If the ports authority was a borrower, it would mean that it had co-signed the Chinese loans and was equally responsible for repayment. But the ports authority is not in any sense a borrower.</p>
<p>Clause 17.5 of the four party agreement quoted by the auditor-general <a href="https://www.oagkenya.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Kenya-Ports-Authority-2017-2018.pdf#page=11">in its report</a> spelled out the relationships: “Each of the Borrower, Kenya Rail Company and Kenya Port Authority agrees…” </p>
<p>Our legal expert immediately noted that this refers to three entities: Kenya’s treasury (the borrower), the rail company and the port authority. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/462030/original/file-20220509-16-rih1nn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Map showing east Africa and lines." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/462030/original/file-20220509-16-rih1nn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/462030/original/file-20220509-16-rih1nn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/462030/original/file-20220509-16-rih1nn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/462030/original/file-20220509-16-rih1nn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/462030/original/file-20220509-16-rih1nn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/462030/original/file-20220509-16-rih1nn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/462030/original/file-20220509-16-rih1nn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">East Africa Standard Gauge Railway.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">China Africa Research Initiative.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Yet this distinction was missed by the auditor-general, who wrongly paraphrased the clause as referring to two entities: “each of the borrowers, in this case Kenya Railways Corporation and Kenya Ports Authority…”</p>
<p>The auditor-general then <a href="https://www.oagkenya.go.ke/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Kenya-Ports-Authority-2017-2018.pdf#page=11">pointed</a> to Clause 17.5 to say that the ports authority was a borrower and therefore its assets were at risk. The auditor accused the ports authority of failing to disclose this during the audit. The auditor-general was operating from incorrect assumptions that influenced its opinion on the ports authority’s responsibilities.</p>
<h2>What does the waiver of sovereign immunity mean?</h2>
<p>The Treasury, Kenya Ports Authority and Kenya Railways Corporation all signed “waivers of sovereign immunity”. This is because all three were parties to various contracts in the overall package. Under international law, sovereign states and entities they control have sovereign immunity. This means they are generally immune from lawsuits and cannot be compelled to appear before a foreign court or arbitration venue, or to enforce a judgement rendered outside their borders. Yet few international banks will offer a loan if there is no possibility of arbitration should a dispute occur and no legal path to recover their money should the borrower default.</p>
<p>A published <a href="https://docs.aiddata.org/ad4/datasets/how_china_lends_dataset_version_1_0.zip">cache of loan contracts</a> signed by Cameroon with banks and export credit agencies from Austria, India, Germany, Spain, Turkey, and the UK shows that all required these clauses. As one American lawyer noted, </p>
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<p>leaving out a sovereign immunity waiver in an international commercial loan contract would be professional malpractice. </p>
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<p>However, there is quite a large gulf between a general sovereign immunity waiver and specifying a particular asset like a port as collateral.</p>
<p>Our findings clarify similar rumours that borrowing governments have pledged strategic assets like land or ports in exchange for Chinese finance. These involve <a href="https://qz.com/africa/1391111/zambia-china-debt-crisis-tests-china-in-africa-relationship/">Zambia</a> (Kenneth Kaunda Airport), <a href="https://chinaafricaproject.com/2022/01/11/financial-times-explores-the-current-state-of-chinese-lending-in-africa/">Uganda</a> (Entebbe Airport) and <a href="http://www.sais-cari.org/s/V4-Briefing-Paper-7-Montenegro-Case-Study-Dec-2021.pdf">Montenegro</a> (Port of Bar). </p>
<p>The debt trap diplomacy fear that borrowers’ strategic assets are directly (and deliberately) at risk from Chinese banks continues to fail the test of evidence.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/182610/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Deborah Brautigam receives funding from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, Grant #129871. </span></em></p>The fear that borrowers’ strategic assets are at risk from Chinese banks continues to fail the test of evidence.Deborah Brautigam, Bernard L. Schwartz Professor of International Political Economy, Johns Hopkins UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1709692021-11-08T15:10:20Z2021-11-08T15:10:20ZKenya’s mega-railway project leaves society more unequal than before<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429909/original/file-20211103-25-cuwbsu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A young man watches a Standard Gauge Railway passenger train zoom over his home in Taita Taveta county, south-eastern Kenya.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 2014, Kenya started to construct a <a href="https://www.railway-technology.com/projects/mombasa-nairobi-standard-gauge-railway-project/#:%7E:text=Main%20construction%20works%20on%20the,of%20operation%20in%20February%202020.">new railway</a> to connect the Mombasa Port with the interior and on to landlocked Uganda and Rwanda. Today the Standard Gauge Railway stops abruptly at <a href="https://www.railway-technology.com/news/kenya-nairobi-naivasha-rail-line/">Naivasha</a>, 120km northwest of Nairobi. Ultimately it is planned to reach the border with Uganda at Malaba, helping to connect East Africa’s regional transport and trade. </p>
<p>Costing <a href="https://www.railway-technology.com/projects/mombasa-nairobi-standard-gauge-railway-project/">US$3.8 billion</a>, 90% of which has been provided by a bilateral loan from the Exim Bank of China to the Government of Kenya, this new passenger and freight railway is the biggest infrastructure project in the history of independent Kenya.</p>
<p>Alongside other large projects such as the Lamu Port-South Sudan-Ethiopia Transport (Lapsset) Corridor, the Standard Gauge Railway is central to Kenya’s current national development policy, <a href="https://vision2030.go.ke">“Vision 2030”</a>. The policy frames these mega-projects as key in attracting the sort of private sector interest needed to fuel economic growth, increase exports and alleviate poverty. </p>
<p><a href="https://news.cgtn.com/news/2019-08-02/China-s-standard-gauge-railway-makes-strong-impact-on-Kenya-s-economy-IPds2CE4zm/index.html">According to China’s state authorities</a>, the construction of the Standard Gauge Railway has driven Kenya’s economic growth by 1.5%, creating 46,000 jobs for local residents.</p>
<p>The reality, however, is far more complicated than such official narratives acknowledge. </p>
<p>In my <a href="https://rgs-ibg.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/tran.12474">study</a>, I analyse the uneven sociopolitical effects of Kenya’s Standard Gauge Railway. In five months of fieldwork research, undertaken during several periods between November 2018 and January 2020 in different urban, peri-urban, and rural locations between Mombasa and Narok, I interviewed over 200 people to understand their experiences of the new railway project. </p>
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<p>I found that, contrary to the government’s promises of prosperity, Kenya’s mega-railway is heading down the wrong track of development. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2021.102459">My research</a> shows that privileged groups, with sufficient access to economic resources, are experiencing several benefits. However, disadvantaged groups, particularly those in remote or historically marginalised regions, have found it more challenging to sustain themselves as a result of large-scale infrastructure development. The railway-related economic growth is not likely to remedy this, as the project planners expect.</p>
<p>In fact, I concluded that, instead of bringing prosperity to people, the railway project is further advancing inequalities in the country. </p>
<h2>The railway and inequalities</h2>
<p>With less than 0.1% (8,300 people) of the population owning more than the bottom 99.9% (more than 44 million people), Kenya is a highly <a href="https://www.oxfam.org/en/kenya-extreme-inequality-numbers">unequal country</a>. This is as a direct result of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/03056240600671258">British colonialism</a> and <a href="https://nation.africa/kenya/news/nepotism-a-deadly-cancer-that-s-slowly-killing-the-kenyan-dream-3349218">rampant nepotism and corruption</a> since independence.</p>
<p>In rural Kenya, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2020.1743068">access to natural resources, like land,</a> is one of the main determining factors of social mobility. Therefore, land acquisitions for the new railway was a significant development. The National Government paid <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/business/sci-tech/article/2001292767/taxpayers-to-pay-more-for-sgr-land">US$29 million</a> to acquire over <a href="https://www.capitalfm.co.ke/business/2016/03/kenya-railways-uses-sh30bn-in-land-compensation-in-sgr-phase-i/">4,500 hectares of land</a> for the first phase of the new railway.</p>
<p>However, this land acquisition primarily benefited large-scale landowners who have received sizeable financial compensation. As my research shows, many of these individuals have been able to reinvest the money in real estate or diversify their livelihoods by starting businesses. </p>
<p>Smallholders and squatters with no official land titles had to vacate the land they had occupied without any financial compensation. </p>
<p>As in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/gec3.12484">other contexts</a> across the Global South, large-scale transport infrastructures like the Standard Gauge Railway also advance the mobility of urban middle classes. With the new railway development in Kenya, this is particularly so for those who regularly travel between Mombasa and Nairobi for work, business or leisure. As the new railway is more efficient than long and exhausting bus trips or expensive flights, these groups are directly benefiting from the new railway line. </p>
<p>Rural populations still prefer to use bus and minibus services that offer more flexibility. To them, the railway also presents a number of direct challenges. In many cases, it blocks the existing travel and access routes, sometimes even dividing family land and splitting villages. Many people I interviewed see the Standard Gauge Railway as a government-controlled project that is only useful to people in Nairobi with no relevance to the rural poor. </p>
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<p>The railway developments have also triggered an investment boom in central Kenya. Areas close to Nairobi have witnessed significant changes in real estate. Since 2016, in Maai Mahiu or Suswa, for instance, where new facilities like stations and depots are located, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2021.102459">land value has increased three-fold</a>. Here the construction of hotels, budget accommodation for truck drivers, and housing for other workers has increased to cash in on the emerging transportation economy. </p>
<p>Other regions of the country, such as Mombasa, <a href="https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/horn-africa/kenya/kenya-s-coast-devolution-disappointed">historically neglected</a> by the central government, are experiencing <a href="https://www.aborne.net/afrigos-african-governance-and-space/2018/12/17/killing-mombasa">a decline</a> in business opportunities. The old port’s customs clearing facilities are being shipped to the new Inland Container Depot close to Nairobi. With it, smaller scale business operations, whether in freight handling services, commerce, or hospitality, are also <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/news/article/2001341988/mombasa-loses-sh17b-in-revenue-after-sgr-order">leaving Mombasa</a>.</p>
<p>As a result, many local business people in my study describe Mombasa as a “dying city that will soon be <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/opinion/2019-08-23-mombasa-dying-a-slow-and-painful-death/">a ghost town</a>”. According to them, Mombasa was busy before the railway construction. It was common to get stuck in traffic for hours when large ships arrived. Now “it is emptier by the day, leaving young men idle, roaming the streets looking for work”.</p>
<h2>The role of China</h2>
<p>Besides funding the new railway, China also has a strong influence in the development of the project. China Road and Bridge Corporation, a Chinese state-owned company, was the main contractor.</p>
<p>To get quicker access to the areas allocated for the development, the corporation directly compensated individual households to vacate land. According to several company managers that I interviewed, the corporation paid US$10 million to meet the project delivery targets on time.</p>
<p>This directly undermines the work of Kenya’s National Land Commission that is mandated to regulate land compensation. Without direct supervision of an official state authority, some people have been able to negotiate better financial deals than others. As my interviews show, some lost out in the process. </p>
<p>Kenya’s government has been criticised by <a href="http://www.okoamombasa.org/show-us-the-contracts/">local civil society</a> for ignoring regulations on project development and instead prioritising short-term stimulus effects over long-term social impacts.</p>
<h2>Uncertain future</h2>
<p>The plan to extend the line from Naivasha to Malaba was <a href="https://www.capitalfm.co.ke/news/2019/04/govt-halts-plan-to-extend-sgr-to-kisumu-over-funding-hitch/">put on hold</a> in April 2019. The Exim Bank reversed its funding, <a href="http://www.chinagoabroad.com/en/article/china-exim-bank-cuts-322-million-standard-gauge-railway-funds">citing the high number of court cases against the project</a>. Other rail projects in the region, such as Tanzania’s, provide alternative options to connect East Africa’s interior with the Indian Ocean. </p>
<p>There is no indication when funding might be made available to extend Kenya railway farther inland. In the meantime, Kenya is <a href="https://www.businessdailyafrica.com/bd/economy/payments-for-sgr-loans-than-double-to-sh97bn-3390740">paying through the teeth</a> for the infrastructure project it once promoted as a <a href="https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/zfhzlt2018/eng/zfgx_4/jmhz/t1727335.htm">“game changer”</a>. It remains to be seen whether it will ever live up to the lofty promises.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/170969/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gediminas Lesutis receives funding from the UK Research and Innovation’s Global Challenges Research Fund (Grant Number: ES/P011500/1), The Development Corridors Partnership.</span></em></p>Contrary to the government’s promises of prosperity, Kenya’s mega-railway is heading down the wrong track of development.Gediminas Lesutis, Marie Curie Fellow, University of AmsterdamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1634612021-06-29T12:05:39Z2021-06-29T12:05:39ZInfrastructure spending has always involved social engineering<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/408430/original/file-20210625-14120-1cg8b11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C0%2C4815%2C3575&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In 1872, John Gast painted 'American Progress,' showing trains and roads spreading across the American West.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:American_Progress_(John_Gast_painting).jpg">John Gast, Library of Congress via Wikimedia Commons</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The effort by Democrats and Republicans in Congress to find agreement over a federal infrastructure spending bill has hinged on a number of factors, including what “infrastructure” actually is – but the debate ignores a key historical fact.</p>
<p>There is <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/infrastructure-plan-opinion-poll/">widespread public support for public investment</a> in building and repairing roads and bridges, water pipes and public schools – as well as providing more elder care and expanding broadband internet access. All of those were part of President Joe Biden’s <a href="https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/biden-unveils-dollar23-trillion-infrastructure-plan/ar-BB1f9oDy">initial US$2.3 trillion infrastructure plan</a>, announced in March 2021.</p>
<p>Republicans criticized the plan in part because of disputes about how to pay for it all, but also by saying that its inclusion of paid sick leave, efforts to fight climate change and investments in child care and medical care were <a href="https://www.northjersey.com/story/news/columnists/mike-kelly/2021/04/09/joe-biden-should-leave-social-programs-out-infrastructure-proposal/7129159002/">not really “infrastructure”</a> but rather “social programs.”</p>
<p>A smaller plan may be passed in a <a href="https://apnews.com/article/biden-senate-infrastructure-deal-731487d7540cdf7e48c27124c43cc2d1">new compromise agreement</a>, but as <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=HfGQnXEAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">historians</a>, we believe it’s important for Americans to understand that infrastructure investment has always involved social programming. That has inevitably meant that it benefited some and disadvantaged others. In our view, Americans have been far too hesitant to acknowledge that many infrastructure projects, whether consciously or through neglect, have hurt communities of color. </p>
<h2>Infrastructure in American history</h2>
<p>It’s true that the most basic or traditional understanding of national infrastructure has focused on transportation. Benjamin Franklin, the nation’s <a href="https://www.history.com/news/us-post-office-benjamin-franklin">first postmaster general</a>, was at the head of a long line of policymakers and presidents to highlight the construction of roads as a way to build the nation’s economy. </p>
<p>They knew it was important for farmers to get goods to market and for our nation’s residents to be able to get timely news from distant locales. Passable roads helped tie the 13 Colonies together. <a href="https://xroads.virginia.edu/%7EHyper/DETOC/transport/canal.html">Canal</a> building <a href="https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/infrastructure/back0103.cfm">road building</a> and then the construction of <a href="https://www.c-span.org/video/?459416-5/railroads-american-culture-19th-century&event=459416&playEvent">railroads</a> were key elements of both building the economy and the nation itself. </p>
<p>As those roads and railroads spread throughout the U.S. in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries, they also carried new waves of migrants into land inhabited over millennia by Native Americans. Those migrants brought diseases and violent land seizures, <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/where-the-buffalo-no-longer-roamed-3067904/">pushing out Native Americans</a>.</p>
<p>For example, in the 1820s, white planters moved into the land taken from the Creeks and other tribes in what is now the Deep South. Millions of enslaved African Americans who had built strong families and communities within the brutal confines of slavery were torn from their homes in the Upper South, some by planters moving to take up cotton land in the new territories, and others by slave traders who purchased enslaved people and sent them to be sold in the <a href="https://slate.com/transcripts/cnVqejZJVVVGTXR4VmFoVVkvWUoyc1MzRnZvVlhuVkhmemdaL3RkZ2hXaz0=">cotton South</a>. </p>
<p>Some roads and <a href="https://americanhistory.si.edu/blog/TRR">railroad projects</a> were aimed at displacing or removing Native Americans from their homelands as part of a larger social agenda to force them to either <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2019/03/traumatic-legacy-indian-boarding-schools/584293/">assimilate</a> or “disappear” – a euphemism for cultural destruction. </p>
<p>Private companies received enormous public subsidies from the federal government – often in the form of Native-occupied land – to build railroads through the Plains. When they did so, they explicitly sought to exterminate bison both to prevent dangerous collisions with locomotives and to starve the Native peoples <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2016/05/the-buffalo-killers/482349/">resisting Western expansion</a>. </p>
<p>In 1867, the <a href="http://www.catskillarchive.com/rrextra/stbuff.Html">Kansas Pacific Railway</a> held bison-hunting events in which the car would slow so passengers could slaughter the large animals from their windows. That same year, an Army official famously <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=pVGrAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA20&lpg=PA20&dq=Kill+every+buffalo+you+can!+Every+buffalo+dead+is+an+Indian+gone&source=bl&ots=R9On_o9HnQ&sig=JGxsXQ0W0NZ4QqBzJIPaqvdx6zs&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjY0aWIo9fMAhUG4yYKHZ-vAs84ChDoAQgnMAI#v=onepage&q=Kill%20every%20buffalo%20you%20can!%20Every%20buffalo%20dead%20is%20an%20Indian%20gone&f=false">quipped</a>: “Kill every buffalo you can! Every buffalo dead is an Indian gone.” </p>
<p>Other projects may not have been intended to be so overtly malicious, but their effects were no less harmful to the societies they affected. There is no evidence, for example, that those who took land from the Creeks gave any thought to the lives of enslaved Virginians, but the resulting interstate slave trade <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/life-in-black-and-white-9780195118032?cc=us&lang=en&">devastated the communities that enslaved Virginians had built over the preceding century</a>. </p>
<p>The infrastructure projects – the building of the roads – were intended to contribute to the nation’s economic development and to benefit white citizens who built prosperous plantations in the Mississippi Delta. They accomplished that. But they did so at enormous, and largely unacknowledged, cost to communities of color.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/408672/original/file-20210628-17-8tgwqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A historic view of Detroit, Michigan, showing the city bisected by an interstate highway." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/408672/original/file-20210628-17-8tgwqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/408672/original/file-20210628-17-8tgwqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408672/original/file-20210628-17-8tgwqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408672/original/file-20210628-17-8tgwqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408672/original/file-20210628-17-8tgwqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408672/original/file-20210628-17-8tgwqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408672/original/file-20210628-17-8tgwqy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A 1955 photograph of Detroit, Michigan, shows the city bisected by a newly built interstate highway.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/highwayhistory/resultsDisplayImg.cfm?img=mi_ford_1955.jpg&results=">U.S. Federal Highway Administration</a></span>
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<h2>Infrastructure as social policy</h2>
<p>The tradition of carrying out social transformation through transportation projects – both what got funded and how it was designed – continued with the <a href="https://www.archives.gov/historical-docs/todays-doc/?dod-date=629">National Interstate and Defense Highways Act of 1956</a>, which built the nation’s web of interstate highways.</p>
<p>The massive new roads had benefits, <a href="https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/interstate/history.cfm">tying the sprawling nation more closely together</a>. But they also divided existing communities, often in ways that exacerbated racial and class inequities. </p>
<p>Some of those highways, such as I-26 on the <a href="https://www.postandcourier.com/news/local_state_news/why-highways-were-designed-to-run-through-black-communities-sc-faces-historic-dilemma-again/article_576f3fce-0976-11eb-a46c-635e6fad5d38.html">Charleston</a> peninsula in South Carolina, cut straight through or successfully isolated <a href="https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/npr/2021/04/12/984784455/a-brief-history-of-how-racism-shaped-interstate-highways/">African American</a> and <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/specials/america-highways-inequality/">Latino communities</a>, and even destroyed homes and businesses to make way <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/03/role-of-highways-in-american-poverty/474282/">for pavement</a>.</p>
<p>The result created “physical barriers to integration” and often worked “to physically entrench racial inequality,” as New York University law professor <a href="https://www.npr.org/transcripts/984784455">Deborah Archer told NPR</a>.</p>
<p>[<em>You’re smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation’s authors and editors.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=youresmart">You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter</a>.]</p>
<h2>Building an infrastructure of inclusion?</h2>
<p>The history of American infrastructure development has always been linked to social development, with productive consequences for some and often-disastrous effects on others.</p>
<p>The compromise bill that will go before Congress is inherently both an infrastructure bill and a social policy bill, regardless of how politicians describe it. It will provide long-awaited and much-needed funds to build new roads and repair dams to foster economic development and may extend broadband to the various communities that have been <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-02-19/where-the-u-s-underestimates-the-digital-divide">left out of the digital economy</a>. But those benefits may not come equally to Americans of all races and economic classes. </p>
<p>People are already attuned to how infrastructure can hurt local communities as much as it can help them. For instance, America’s biggest current environmental battle is being fought in Minnesota, where <a href="https://thehill.com/changing-america/sustainability/infrastructure/559660-americas-biggest-environmental-battle-erupts">Native American activists</a> oppose the construction of yet another fossil-fuel pipeline that threatens the waterways and ecology of the entire region.</p>
<p>As history shows, infrastructure simply cannot be considered separately from social programs. Trying to do so makes it less likely that leaders and society as a whole will notice, or seek to improve, the social consequences of what gets built – to those who benefit, and those at whose expense the development may come.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/163461/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Government investment in roads, railroads and other public services has always involved social programming, both for good and for ill.Erika M Bsumek, Associate Professor of History, The University of Texas at AustinJames Sidbury, Professor of History, Rice UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1598132021-06-28T15:04:32Z2021-06-28T15:04:32ZKenya’s huge railway project is causing environmental damage. Here’s how<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/407868/original/file-20210623-17-1yheh3p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Impalas walk near the elevated Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) in Nairobi National Park, Kenya.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">YASUYOSHI CHIBA/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Kenya is constructing a railway line that connects the coastal port of Mombasa and the interior of the country. It is expected to terminate at Malaba, a town on the border with Uganda, and link up with other railways that are being built in East Africa. It’s locally known as the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR).</p>
<p>The passenger and freight railway line is <a href="https://www.railway-technology.com/projects/mombasa-nairobi-standard-gauge-railway-project/">one of the biggest</a> infrastructure investments in Kenya’s history. Construction began in 2014 at an estimated cost of <a href="https://ecdpm.org/great-insights/regional-integration-dynamics-africa/railway-rivalry-east-african-community/">US$3.8 billion</a>, 90% of which is supplied by a loan from the Export-Import (Exim) Bank of China and 10% from the Kenyan government. </p>
<p>Although the actual land area affected by the railway itself is small, parts of it are raised and it cuts through a wide range of the country’s ecologically fragile and important ecosystems. For instance, the railway cuts across Tsavo Conservation Area (which supports <a href="https://tsavotrust.org/super-tusker-elephants-saving-the-last-of-africas-great-megafauna/">about 40%</a> of Kenya’s elephant population) and the Nairobi National Park. It also traverses range lands in southern Kenya that support pastoral communities and are vulnerable to the impacts of climate and changes in land use.</p>
<p>My colleagues and I <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0246248">carried out a study</a> to gain insights into all the impacts the railway was having on the environment. </p>
<p>The construction of the railway is being done in three phases. The first two phases (now completed) cover 610km. The third phase is still under construction. Our study focused along the entire stretch of the first two phases, covering eight counties from Mombasa to Narok. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/408117/original/file-20210624-23-qlsg5o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/408117/original/file-20210624-23-qlsg5o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408117/original/file-20210624-23-qlsg5o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408117/original/file-20210624-23-qlsg5o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408117/original/file-20210624-23-qlsg5o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408117/original/file-20210624-23-qlsg5o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/408117/original/file-20210624-23-qlsg5o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=522&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Map of the railway corridor.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The project involves many stakeholders including various levels of government (such as the National Environment Management Authority and Kenya Wildlife Service), local communities, civil society organisations and the private sector. For our study, we hosted group interviews and meetings with 54 key informants from all these sectors. </p>
<p>We found that the construction and operation of the railways has degraded, fragmented and destroyed key ecosystems. It increased soil erosion, land degradation, flooding and habitat destruction. It also affected water bodies and wildlife movement.</p>
<p>Environmental impact assessments for the railway were conducted, and these are of an <a href="https://www.iaia.org/">international standard</a>. The final reports, which included recommendations, were written to facilitate licensing by the National Environment Management Authority, the government regulator.</p>
<p>However, it’s become clear that the recommendations weren’t fully implemented. Several observers identified a lack of funding, technical capacity and political interference as some of the barriers.</p>
<p>Project proponents must develop measures that properly mitigate the key ecosystem challenges and ensure they’re enforced.</p>
<h2>Impact on land</h2>
<p>Participants in our study identified that the railway line had an impact on soil, water and air contamination, during construction and operation of the line.</p>
<p>During construction, soil was compacted and excavated. It was also moved from one location to another to erect embankments. This has many effects on the environment. For instance, Community Forest Association officials (around the coastal mangrove forests in Mombasa) observed that sediment, eroded from the rail embankments, affected streams and plants. They said that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>not only did it affect mangroves seed development and self-germination but also blocked streams and reduced the stream size…</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Another challenge was that underpasses were built to allow for movement under the railway. This is because the railway is raised. But these underpasses redirected surface water and rainfall courses. Respondents from Narok county observed that this led to erosion, leading to the siltation of water sources, including Lake Magadi – a unique saline, alkaline lake which is surrounded by wildlife and a major source of <a href="https://www.saltworkconsultants.com/lake-magadi-kenya/">trona</a>. This is a sodium carbonate compound that is processed into soda ash or bicarbonate of soda.</p>
<p>Another impact was the blasting of land for construction material. Communities around Nairobi said that this caused tremors, sometimes causing buildings to crack. </p>
<h2>Flooding</h2>
<p>Floods have been a major challenge. To avoid cutting through the railway embankments, contractors rerouted natural surface water flows (such as streams) to the underpasses. </p>
<p>But this led to increases in the volume and speed of the water flow which caused flooding and soil erosion. This was compounded by the clearing of surrounding vegetation, which would usually slow water down. </p>
<p>In Voi, county officials explained how storm water flooded low lying homesteads and farms during heavy rains. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/407872/original/file-20210623-21-e9s7f2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/407872/original/file-20210623-21-e9s7f2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=267&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407872/original/file-20210623-21-e9s7f2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=267&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407872/original/file-20210623-21-e9s7f2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=267&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407872/original/file-20210623-21-e9s7f2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=335&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407872/original/file-20210623-21-e9s7f2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=335&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407872/original/file-20210623-21-e9s7f2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=335&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A blocked river in Kitengela.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In addition, silt from construction led to the blockage or drying up of rivers, notably the Empakashe and Mbagathi rivers around Nairobi. Most communities in these areas rely on the rivers for domestic consumption, watering their livestock and irrigation agriculture.</p>
<h2>Pollution</h2>
<p>Another concern was oil spills. These occurred due to fuel transport accidents and because of train and railway maintenance activities. </p>
<p>For instance, local officials in Kibwezi County said that an oil spill polluted the <a href="https://www.the-star.co.ke/counties/eastern/2019-11-29-thange-river-environs-still-tainted-by-oil-spill/">Thange River</a>. Now the river can’t be used for irrigation or domestic purposes. The land in the affected area is still unsafe for cultivation.</p>
<p>Noise pollution was also reported during construction and operation of the railway, particularly in the areas around Nairobi and Voi. Some communities were unable to sleep and school classes were disrupted due to the noise levels.</p>
<p>Dust pollution was an additional challenge. There were reports of coughs and chest pain.</p>
<p>Communities relying on wetlands and rivers in Voi, Kibwezi, Tuala and Narok areas lost access to some of these critical resources, and the long-term prospects are unclear. </p>
<p>An additional impact of the railway was the emergence of illegal activities, such as grazing in protected areas. </p>
<p>Officials of the Kenya Wildlife Service observed that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>local communities {were} using the underpasses to pass their livestock through to Tsavo National Park particularly around Buchuma gate.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The livestock incursions resulted in serious soil degradation in the southern part of Tsavo East.</p>
<p>Wildlife was also affected. <a href="https://www.railway-technology.com/projects/mombasa-nairobi-standard-gauge-railway-project/">About 120km</a> of the line traverses through a key wildlife area, Kenya’s Tsavo National Park.</p>
<p>We learnt that elephants displayed early signs of behavioural modification. This included aggression and avoidance of the railway area.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"969496232929517568"}"></div></p>
<p>These are consistent with behavioural adaptations observed among other species which <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3801107">shift their home ranges</a> or <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/2403836">alter their movement patterns</a> due to infrastructure.</p>
<h2>What next</h2>
<p>Linear infrastructure projects like the railway must develop sustainable and ecologically sensitive measures to mitigate these impacts. </p>
<p>For example, underpasses must be at the right density and of the right size. At present, the underpasses are few and are located in areas not used regularly by wildlife. </p>
<p>In addition, water courses should be channelled and redirected to avoid flooding.</p>
<p>Furthermore another full assessment, involving all stakeholders, is needed of the environmental impacts of the railway. This is key to designing a sustainable railway. It must ensure that development gains are maximised while the ecosystem impacts are minimised.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/159813/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tobias Nyumba receives funding from the UK Research and Innovation’s Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) under the Development Corridors Partnership (DCP) project. </span></em></p>Oil spills, cracked buildings and pollution. Just some of the environmental effects of Kenya’s massive railway project.Tobias Nyumba, Post Doctoral Research Fellow, University of NairobiLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1609322021-06-20T20:17:03Z2021-06-20T20:17:03ZNSW on a slow track to fast trains: promised regional rail upgrades are long overdue<p>We have seen a succession of reviews, plans and election promises of faster and better train services for regional New South Wales, home to one <a href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/about-nsw/key-facts-about-nsw">third of the state’s population</a>, in recent years. Yet little had been heard from the state government on track works to allow new trains to travel faster until April 29 this year. This was when Premier Gladys Berejiklian <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/people-said-couldn-t-be-done-premier-says-nsw-on-track-for-faster-rail-network-20210428-p57n5n.html">told</a> a Sydney conference that serious regional development will need faster rail (trains moving at 150-200km/h on upgraded track with some straightening of track) and fast rail (speeds of 200-250km/h on new dedicated track).</p>
<p>The promised <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/people-said-couldn-t-be-done-premier-says-nsw-on-track-for-faster-rail-network-20210428-p57n5n.html">outcomes</a> include Sydney to Newcastle by rail in an hour rather than two-and-a-half hours, 25 minutes taken off Sydney-Wollongong and Sydney-Gosford train trips and travel between Sydney and Goulburn in under an hour instead of two-and-a-half hours for express trains. Details are still awaited on which lines will take priority and the scope of this work.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-can-halve-train-travel-times-between-our-cities-by-moving-to-faster-rail-116512">We can halve train travel times between our cities by moving to faster rail</a>
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<p>These developments have been years in the making. In late 2018, the NSW government <a href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/a-fast-rail-future-for-nsw">announced</a> international expert Andrew McNaughton would advise the government how best to deliver a fast rail network to connect Sydney to regional centres. Four lines were identified:</p>
<ul>
<li>north to the Central Coast, Newcastle and beyond</li>
<li>west via Lithgow to Orange/Parkes</li>
<li>southern inland to Goulburn/Canberra</li>
<li>southern coastal to Wollongong/Nowra. </li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/406664/original/file-20210616-3785-1vkid69.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Map showing routes of four fast rail lines between Sydney and regional NSW" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/406664/original/file-20210616-3785-1vkid69.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/406664/original/file-20210616-3785-1vkid69.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406664/original/file-20210616-3785-1vkid69.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406664/original/file-20210616-3785-1vkid69.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406664/original/file-20210616-3785-1vkid69.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406664/original/file-20210616-3785-1vkid69.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406664/original/file-20210616-3785-1vkid69.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The four fast rail lines connecting Sydney to regional NSW.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/a-fast-rail-future-for-nsw">A fast rail future for NSW/NSW government</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This followed a 20-Year Economic Vision for Regional NSW (recently <a href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/a-20-year-economic-vision-for-regional-nsw-refresh">refreshed</a>), which included a commitment to “make regional travel faster, easier and safer between and within regional centres, and to metropolitan areas”.</p>
<p>Transport for NSW also released a <a href="https://future.transport.nsw.gov.au/plans/greater-newcastle-future-transport-plan">Greater Newcastle Future Transport Plan</a> in 2018. The plan outlined track work to enable trains to travel at higher speeds (with new ones now being delivered). This work included “reducing track curvature, deviations and realignments, removal of level crossings, junction rearrangement and better segregation of passenger and freight services”. </p>
<p>There have also been three studies of NSW track upgrades co-funded by the <a href="https://www.nfra.gov.au/">National Faster Rail Agency</a>.</p>
<p>In the lead-up to the March 2019 NSW election, funding was announced for a limited suite of track upgrades on the four main lines linking Sydney to regional NSW. The government also raised expectations of a new line from Eden to Cooma and the reinstatement of the line from Cooma to Canberra. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-nsw-election-promises-on-transport-add-up-112531">How the NSW election promises on transport add up</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/h7bMvkP5yLM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A NSW government video outlining the promise of fast rail in late 2018.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Much slow running of regional trains on each of the four main lines from Sydney is on sections of track that, about 100 years ago, were reconstructed with less steep climbs than 19th-century track. This allowed steam locomotives to handle heavier loads, but came at the expense of extra length and more curves. </p>
<p>Such track now slows down modern <a href="https://edisontechcenter.org/Dieseltrains.html">electric and diesel trains</a>. The table below shows the extent of the problem in NSW. It also shows indicative time savings from reverting to straighter track alignments (found in most cases by <a href="http://railknowledgebank.com/Presto/home/home.aspx">simulation work</a> by my co-researcher, Max Michell).</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/406669/original/file-20210616-15-1dgzn0o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Table showing time savings from straighter track alignments on NSW regional rail lines" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/406669/original/file-20210616-15-1dgzn0o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/406669/original/file-20210616-15-1dgzn0o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=303&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406669/original/file-20210616-15-1dgzn0o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=303&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406669/original/file-20210616-15-1dgzn0o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=303&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406669/original/file-20210616-15-1dgzn0o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406669/original/file-20210616-15-1dgzn0o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406669/original/file-20210616-15-1dgzn0o.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Table: The Conversation. Data: Author provided</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Other states acted decades ago</h2>
<p>Following track-straightening works between Brisbane and Cairns for faster and heavier freight trains, in 1998 Queensland Rail introduced a tilt train operating at speeds of up to 170km/h between Brisbane and Rockhampton. The train was well received and by 2002 had carried <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_Tilt_Train">1 million passengers</a>.</p>
<p>In 2004, new <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Prospector_(train_service)">Prospector diesel rail cars</a> were introduced to allow Perth-Kalgoorlie services to operate up to 160km/h with an average of 100km/h. </p>
<p>Victoria’s Regional Fast Rail Project was mostly completed by 2006. Following track upgrades on four lines to Bendigo, Ballarat (with deviations to improve train times), Geelong and Gippsland, new V/Locity trains travel at 160km/h. Within five years, patronage on these services had <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regional_Fast_Rail_project">doubled</a>. </p>
<p>Victoria has followed up with two further extensive track upgrading programs, each with significant federal funding. The first was <a href="https://www.victrack.com.au/projects/past-projects/regional-rail-link">Regional Rail Link</a> (2009-15). Currently, at a cost of over A$4 billion, <a href="https://bigbuild.vic.gov.au/projects/regional-rail-revival">Regional Rail Revival</a> is upgrading every regional line in the state.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/this-is-how-regional-rail-can-help-ease-our-big-cities-commuter-crush-81902">This is how regional rail can help ease our big cities' commuter crush</a>
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</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>What about a decent service to Canberra?</h2>
<p>Sydney-Canberra train services are too few and too slow. High-speed rail options with trains capable of 250km/h or more on dedicated track for Sydney to Canberra, and beyond, have been studied extensively since 1984. In 1998, SpeedRail received in-principle support from the Howard government but that did not extend to financial support.</p>
<p>The uptake of bus travel – one operator offers a service on the hour for 12 hours a day – suggests more and faster train services would be well received. </p>
<p>In 2020, Infrastructure Australia listed an upgrade of this rail link as a “<a href="https://www.infrastructureaustralia.gov.au/map/sydney-canberra-rail-connectivity-and-capacity">priority initiative</a>”.</p>
<p>The train service linking Australia’s largest city with the national capital has been <a href="https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6747301/the-case-for-fast-rail-from-canberra-to-sydney/">taken to task</a> by many commentators. It was recently well described as a “<a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/nsw-signals-renewed-focus-on-privatisation-will-go-it-alone-on-fast-rail-20210429-p57nl4.html">national disgrace</a>”. By way of contrast, New York to Washington DC has many more trains, which are <a href="https://www.amtrak.com/alternative-to-buses-new-york-city-washington-dc-train">much faster than buses</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="train at station" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/406895/original/file-20210616-3629-11rfibv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/406895/original/file-20210616-3629-11rfibv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406895/original/file-20210616-3629-11rfibv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406895/original/file-20210616-3629-11rfibv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406895/original/file-20210616-3629-11rfibv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406895/original/file-20210616-3629-11rfibv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/406895/original/file-20210616-3629-11rfibv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The slow rail service between Sydney and Canberra has been dubbed a ‘national disgrace’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/express-train-canberra-sydney-central-station-556274326">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Back to New South Wales</h2>
<p>NSW has a <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/nsw-charges-ahead-with-107-billion-infrastructure-pipeline-despite-record-deficit-20201117-p56fan.html">A$107 billion</a> “infastructure pipeline”. However, on a population basis, Sydney with its metros and motorways is getting much more than its fair share. Regional NSW is getting left behind. </p>
<p>The imbalance is increasing. The late 2020 budget allocated billions for the Sydney West Metro and preconstruction work on the <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-another-huge-and-costly-road-project-really-sydneys-best-option-right-now-136836">dubious Western Harbour Tunnel project</a>. </p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/is-another-huge-and-costly-road-project-really-sydneys-best-option-right-now-136836">Is another huge and costly road project really Sydney's best option right now?</a>
</strong>
</em>
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<p>Many NSW regional communities increasingly consider that their major party MPs haven’t had their best interests at heart. This is one reason for the election in 2019 of four lower house members from minor parties plus one independent. In the recent Upper Hunter byelection, the combined primary vote for the ALP and the Nationals was <a href="https://pastvtr.elections.nsw.gov.au/SB2101/la/upper-hunter/fp_summary_report.html">just over 50%</a>. </p>
<p>Serious track work is now needed to lift NSW regional train speeds to those enjoyed in other states. As the Illawarra Rail Fail group sang in this YouTube video, regional NSW needs more trains and faster travel times to get us on our way.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4S3Xqzpz4Fk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The Illawarra Rail Fail group has been campaigning for years for better services to the south coast.</span></figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/160932/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Philip Laird owns shares in some transport companies and has received funding from the two rail-related CRCs as well as the ARC. He is affiliated, inter alia, with Action for Public Transport (NSW), the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport, the Railway Technical Society of Australasia and the Rail Futures Institute. The opinions expressed are those of the author. </span></em></p>Regional NSW, home to a third of the state’s population, is still waiting for the promise of faster train travel to be delivered. Other states improved their regional services years ago.Philip Laird, Honorary Principal Fellow, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1617062021-06-10T14:44:53Z2021-06-10T14:44:53ZClimate change is a threat to Africa’s transport systems: what must be done<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/403990/original/file-20210602-19-17ds1lb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Railway bridge over the river on the border with Tanzania. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">vladimirat/Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Transportation infrastructure, such as roads and railway systems, is one of the sectors most threatened by climate change. Extreme weather events – such as flooding, sea level rises and storm surges – <a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/ipcc_wg3_ar5_chapter8.pdf">repeatedly</a> wreak havoc on transport networks. </p>
<p>In Africa, extreme weather is a threat that can cause extensive structural damage. It can also accelerate the ageing of infrastructure components. This can lead to considerable <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/transport/publication/enhancing-the-climate-resilience-of-africas-infrastructure-the-roads-and-bridges-sector">financial losses</a>. </p>
<p>For instance, a <a href="https://www.itrc.org.uk/casestudies/transport-risk-analysis-for-the-united-republic-of-tanzania-systemic-vulnerability-assessment-of-multi-modal-transport-networks/">recent report</a> on Tanzania uncovered the vulnerability of the country’s transportation systems. Long stretches of road and rail networks are exposed to extreme flooding events, with growing exposure in the future. </p>
<p>The report estimated that worst-case disruptions to Tanzania’s multi-modal transport networks could cause losses of up to US$1.4 million per day. In addition, damage to these networks can disrupt the flow of goods and people, thereby lowering economic productivity.</p>
<p>This suggests that governments must ensure that transport infrastructure is developed with the ability to cope with current and future climatic shifts. </p>
<p>Fortunately an effective way to “climate-proof” transport infrastructure already exists within the planning machinery of governments. In our <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17565529.2021.1911774?journalCode=tcld20">recent work</a>, which investigated the Standard Gauge Rail project in Tanzania, we show how climate change and adaptation capabilities can be incorporated in environmental impact assessment procedures. </p>
<p>Environmental impact assessment is a widespread environmental safeguard. It’s used by governments, donors and lending agencies when approving new development projects or major expansions to existing ones. The process can be used to identify climate risks and ensure that they are minimised through environmentally sound project design. </p>
<p>Transport infrastructure is vital to developing countries because efficient and reliable transport networks are critical for local and international trade. We hope that, with a changing climate, our findings offer useful lessons for policymakers, planners and developers. </p>
<h2>Checking for risks</h2>
<p>Environmental impact assessment is the essential process of identifying, predicting and evaluating the likely environmental impacts of a proposed development action, both positive and negative. These are risks to the project, and risks to the natural environment from the project. </p>
<p>The assessment is meant to happen before major decisions are taken and commitments made. Developers, both private and public, often commission registered environmental experts to carry out the study.</p>
<p>Virtually every country has some form of legislation that requires an environmental impact assessment. These are carried out on certain development projects, particularly those likely to have significant effects on the environment. This often includes major transport infrastructure. </p>
<p>The study culminates in a set of observations and recommendations, which regulators and developers are meant to take on board. Legislation usually provides for followups on whether they were. In countries with strong institutional frameworks, violators often face fines, suspension of operations or even jail time. </p>
<p>Because the assessment has to be carried out for major projects, it offers an efficient and direct way to include adaptation measures. </p>
<h2>Tanzania’s railway</h2>
<p>This is <a href="https://www.jica.go.jp/english/our_work/social_environmental/id/africa/tanzania/c8h0vm000090rkh9-att/c8h0vm0000a2nptn.pdf">what happened</a> for Tanzania’s Standard Gauge Railway.</p>
<p>The railway, a US$14.2 billion investment by the Tanzanian government, is currently under construction. It’s part of the <a href="https://developmentcorridors.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Tanzania-Scoping-Study.pdf">“central corridor”</a> connecting Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. It will also provide access to the Indian ocean. The government contracted a Turkish firm, Yapi Merkezi, to design and build the project’s first phase, traversing about 541km. Work started in 2017. </p>
<p>Because it is vulnerable to climate change – <a href="https://www.jica.go.jp/english/our_work/social_environmental/id/africa/tanzania/c8h0vm000090rkh9-att/c8h0vm0000a2nptn.pdf">there are particular concerns over</a> heavy floods and landslides – the environmental impact assessment has tried to prepare the project for potential climate risks. </p>
<p>The assessment was conducted by a multidisciplinary team under an international consulting firm, <a href="https://www.erm.com/">Environmental Resources Management</a>. They carried out climate projections along the proposed route and outlined adaptation measures for the projected risks.</p>
<p>Recommendations included using heat-resistant asphalt, installing flood defence walls and using reinforced steel. They also proposed a monitoring plan which outlined key monitoring aspects, indicators, responsible parties and timing.</p>
<p>Climate change issues are not explicitly prescribed by Tanzanian environmental impact assessment law and regulations. The drive to carry out the assessment was a result of pressure from climate-sensitive international lenders. It remains to be seen if the recommendations are implemented throughout construction and following project phases. </p>
<p>Our study demonstrates the huge potential of environmental impact assessments to foster adaptation in transport projects. It makes sense. Most African countries <a href="https://climatepolicyinitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/A-Snapshot-of-Global-Adaptation-Investment-and-Tracking-Methods-April-2020.pdf">lack the necessary resources</a> to invest in stand-alone adaptation projects. </p>
<h2>Roadblocks to remove</h2>
<p>Even though integrating climate change adaptation into an environmental impact assessment is a simple step, it’s not being done.</p>
<p>This is due to several challenges including a lack of knowledge, awareness, technical and financial resources, and legislative support. Tanzania’s laws and regulations, for instance, do not specifically mandate the practice.</p>
<p>Moreover, developers seldom go beyond what the law requires. Because of factors such as costs or time constraints, they would naturally view such requirements as unwelcome. Additional project approval processes could lead to delays and increased costs for the developer. </p>
<h2>Climate-proofing projects</h2>
<p>To ensure projects are “climate-proofed” in future, several steps must be taken.</p>
<p>First, laws and regulations must be formalised so that climate change is included in the assessment process. These must be supported by technical guidelines and strategic planning. </p>
<p>Second, there’s a need to make substantial investments in building capacity and raising awareness at the institutional level. In addition, climate data must be available and communication between climate scientists and assessment practitioners should be strengthened.</p>
<p>Finally, our paper calls for adaptation aid providers, development partners and international lenders – such as the World Bank, Africa Development Bank and the IMF – to leverage their influence, for instance through funding procedures. This would add pressure to include climate change scenarios in the planning process.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/161706/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Governments must ensure that transport infrastructure is developed with the ability to cope with current and future climatic shifts.Amani George Rweyendela, Assistant Lecturer, Department of Environmental Engineering and Management, University of DodomaWilliam John Mwegoha, Associate Professor, Department of Environmental Engineering and Management, University of DodomaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1585892021-05-21T12:27:08Z2021-05-21T12:27:08ZPandemic-stricken mass transit would get $85 billion in Biden stimulus plan – a down payment on reviving American cities<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401721/original/file-20210519-13-1is09cw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=36%2C0%2C5993%2C4013&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority was hit hard by a 79% ridership reduction during the pandemic. It needs an extra $8 billion through 2024 to avoid service cuts and layoffs.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/pedestrians-pass-by-a-subway-station-in-manhattan-on-may-17-news-photo/1318524077?adppopup=true">Spencer Platt/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Congress now has control over what kind of commute – good, bad, awful – workers returning to offices in the U.S. will have.</p>
<p>President Joe Biden’s <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/03/31/fact-sheet-the-american-jobs-plan/">American Jobs Plan</a>, released in March 2021, includes US$85 billion for city transit agencies to improve their systems by purchasing new buses and train cars and maintaining subway stations and tracks. </p>
<p>If passed in Congress, the dollars would explicitly build on the relief already provided to cities in last year’s <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/legislation/2021/01/20/president-biden-announces-american-rescue-plan/">American Rescue Plan</a>, according to the White House. That coronavirus relief bill, passed in March 2020, kept fare-starved buses, trains and subways running throughout the pandemic, often with scaled-back service, <a href="https://transitcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/TC_Covid_FINAL_Pages-1.pdf">helping millions of U.S. workers</a> to reach jobs providing essential services. The money covered <a href="https://www.ncsl.org/ncsl-in-dc/publications-and-resources/american-rescue-plan-act-of-2021.aspx">payroll, rider safety measures and pandemic protective equipment for drivers</a>.</p>
<p>Each of these bills supports <a href="https://www.democrats.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/American%20Rescue%20Plan%20Act%20-%205307%20Runs%20(Tentative)%203.8.21.pdf">public transit systems</a> in different but critical ways. U.S. transit agencies have always maintained a delicate balance in how they spend scarce taxpayer money, between <a href="https://infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/transit/">operations and capital investment</a>. </p>
<p>In practice, both are necessary to keep subway and bus systems running – and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=zbew56MAAAAJ&hl=en">as a scholar of urban planning</a> who studies transportation systems, I emphasize the necessity of reliable mass transit to revitalize American cities post-pandemic. </p>
<h2>Languishing systems</h2>
<p>Even before COVID-19, transit agencies lacked the money to maintain their systems. </p>
<p>In a <a href="https://infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/transit/">recent report</a> the American Society of Civil Engineers gave a D minus to American transit infrastructure. The country’s aging “fixed-rail” systems, <a href="https://eh.net/encyclopedia/urban-mass-transit-in-the-united-states/">a category that includes subways, commuter rail and light rail</a>, are in chronic disrepair. Boston’s subway system opened in 1897 and others shortly thereafter, or in the 1960s and 1970s. Over time, these systems require more investment just to maintain reliable service. </p>
<p>During recessions, however, many have foregone it out of financial necessity. And starting around 2014, <a href="https://www.apta.com/wp-content/uploads/APTA-2020-Survey-Impact-COVID-19-Agencies.pdf">transit agencies saw declining ridership</a> – and resulting revenue decreases – as on-demand services like Uber and Lyft expanded nationwide. </p>
<p>The American Society of Civil Engineers documented the predictable consequences. The industry has $176 billion in needed investments that is expected to grow to <a href="https://infrastructurereportcard.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Transit-2021.pdf">$250 billion by 2029</a>. Currently, 19% of transit vehicles and 6% of tracks and tunnels are rated in “poor condition.” </p>
<h2>Essential service for all workers</h2>
<p>The pandemic further upset the fragile <a href="https://www.apta.com/wp-content/uploads/APTA-COVID-19-Funding-Impact-2021-01-27.pdf">financial balance of American mass transit</a>.</p>
<p>Ridership on subways, trains and buses nationwide plummeted <a href="https://www.apta.com/wp-content/uploads/2020-Q4-Ridership-APTA.pdf">80% during April 2020</a> as people who could work remotely did. Large-scale events, like sports and concerts, were canceled. People increasingly ordered goods online.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401723/original/file-20210519-12241-s5mwrm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Four gleaming, clean and unused ticket-vending machines in a subway station" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401723/original/file-20210519-12241-s5mwrm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401723/original/file-20210519-12241-s5mwrm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401723/original/file-20210519-12241-s5mwrm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401723/original/file-20210519-12241-s5mwrm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=391&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401723/original/file-20210519-12241-s5mwrm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401723/original/file-20210519-12241-s5mwrm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401723/original/file-20210519-12241-s5mwrm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=492&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An empty Metro station in Los Angeles, Calif., on March 19, 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-empty-metro-subway-station-is-seen-during-the-covid-19-news-photo/1217215255?adppopup=true">Morgan Lieberman/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Some people – those who deliver goods, pick up trash and take care of patients – never stopped reporting to work during the pandemic. Other essential workers, such as construction and restaurant staff, soon resumed on-site work. But cities saw <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/03/08/climate/nyc-transit-covid.html">much less daily movement</a> of people. </p>
<p>Studies suggest that the sharpest decline in transit ridership occurred in regions with higher percentages of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trd.2020.102654">white, educated and high-income workers</a>. Regions with more jobs in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trd.2020.102654">trade, transportation and utilities</a> saw lower declines. So did transit systems in <a href="https://www.govtech.com/fs/after-a-devastating-year-transit-is-adapting-to-the-future.html">the South</a>, where a higher percentage of riders may be essential workers.</p>
<p>Less money from fares was compounded by reductions to the various local and state taxes and other revenue sources that <a href="https://www.apta.com/wp-content/uploads/APTA-COVID-19-Funding-Impact-2021-01-27.pdf">help support transit operations</a>. New York’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/03/08/climate/nyc-transit-covid.html">Metropolitan Transportation Authority</a> says it will require an additional <a href="https://new.mta.info/document/30186">$8 billion through 2024 to avoid service cuts and layoffs</a>.</p>
<h2>Everyone wants good transit</h2>
<p>Many essential workers are what transportation planners often refer to as “captive riders” – they have to use public transit. They contrast with higher-income “choice riders,” who sometimes own cars. </p>
<p>This longstanding distinction between “captive” and “choice” transit riders, however, <a href="https://usa.streetsblog.org/2016/07/12/the-choice-vs-captive-transit-rider-dichotomy-is-all-wrong/">ignores that most people who live in cities</a> want affordable and convenient ways to reach a diversity of destinations, not just their offices but also <a href="https://nytransit.org/resources/public-transit-facts">shops, their friends’ houses, parks and theaters</a>.</p>
<p>Ultimately, how urbanites get to those places depends on where they live. According to a <a href="https://transitcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/TransitCenter-WOB-2016.pdf">survey of 3,000 transit riders</a> nationwide conducted by the New York nonprofit TransitCenter, “in walkable neighborhoods with frequent transit service, people with and without cars both ride transit more than people in areas with poor transit.”</p>
<p>This is why public transit’s societal benefits extend beyond shuttling people to and from work. It offers choice about how they travel, which reduces congestion. According to the <a href="https://static.tti.tamu.edu/tti.tamu.edu/documents/mobility-report-2019.pdf">Texas A&M Transportation Institute</a>, the average driving commuter wastes 54 hours per year in traffic, costing them $1,080 in wasted time and fuel. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401725/original/file-20210519-21-1w5vw3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Congested highway with a city in background" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401725/original/file-20210519-21-1w5vw3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/401725/original/file-20210519-21-1w5vw3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401725/original/file-20210519-21-1w5vw3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401725/original/file-20210519-21-1w5vw3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401725/original/file-20210519-21-1w5vw3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401725/original/file-20210519-21-1w5vw3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/401725/original/file-20210519-21-1w5vw3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Boston at evening rush hour on Aug. 6, 2020. By then, state data suggested that traffic was approaching pre-pandemic levels.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/boston-traffic-at-evening-rush-hour-on-aug-6-2020-state-news-photo/1227951361?adppopup=true">Barry Chin/The Boston Globe via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>Many large urban areas can expect extreme <a href="https://news.vanderbilt.edu/2020/06/05/transportation-lab-predicts-extreme-traffic-for-some-cities-following-covid-19/">traffic congestion this year as workers stop working remotely</a> – if they choose cars over public transportation. Fifty-five percent of Americans <a href="https://infrastructurereportcard.org/cat-item/transit/">have access to transit</a>. But car owners will drive if subways and buses cannot maintain frequent, convenient and reliable service. </p>
<h2>Transit is safe</h2>
<p>As for COVID-19 risk on public transportation, evidence shows <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/08/10/nyregion/nyc-subway-coronavirus.html">it is quite low</a>.</p>
<p>The ventilation systems in most transit systems are better than many other indoor spaces. In addition to mandatory mask-wearing, many cities – including Detroit and San Antonio – made transit free or enabled back-door entry <a href="https://nacto.org/covid19-rapid-response-tools-for-transit-agencies/">to limit rider-driver interactions</a>.</p>
<p>These COVID-19 safety protocols, along with good air flow, ensured the safety of transit passengers throughout the pandemic. Enforcing the <a href="https://theconversation.com/public-transit-drivers-struggle-to-enforce-mask-mandates-154689">mask requirement will remain a challenge</a>.</p>
<p>Worldwide, transit agencies in Korea, China and Taiwan continued to carry between 70% and 90% of typical ridership without new local cases among riders. Studies in Japan and France, using contract tracing, showed <a href="https://transitcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/FactSheetFinal.pdf">limited connections between transit usage and COVID-19 clusters</a></p>
<p>If Congress passes the American Jobs Plan, the infrastructure funding it sends to cities and states will encourage American transit agencies to upgrade their buses, trains and subways, improve tracks or expand service <a href="https://apta.com/wp-content/uploads/TRANSIT_PRIORITIES_POST_PANDEMIC_Nov_2020.pdf">for all workers returning to their regular lives</a>. The package allows cities to spend their portion of the $85 billion to <a href="https://escholarship.org/content/qt15t657r2/qt15t657r2.pdf?t=qpo52c">provide the kind of frequent, reliable and less costly service</a> that makes mass transit a more appealing option than a rideshare service. </p>
<p>Good mass transit also encourages people to travel in cities – fueling the pandemic recovery that people badly want and the economy so desperately needs.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/158589/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ruth Steiner receives funding from United States Department of Transportation (under their University Transportation Center Program (see <a href="https://www.transportation.gov/content/university-transportation-centers">https://www.transportation.gov/content/university-transportation-centers</a>)) and Florida Department of Transportation. </span></em></p>Transit agencies could use the money to buy new subway cars, buses and maintain rails. The funding is designed to build on last year’s emergency aid, which kept transit operating through the pandemic.Ruth Steiner, Professor of Urban and Regional Planning, University of FloridaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1539692021-02-05T18:27:51Z2021-02-05T18:27:51ZSlave-built infrastructure still creates wealth in US, suggesting reparations should cover past harms and current value of slavery<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382613/original/file-20210204-14-1kyoub7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C23%2C5301%2C3520&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Port of Savannah used to export cotton picked by enslaved laborers and brought from Alabama to Georgia on slave-built railways. Cotton is still a top product processed through this port.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/shipping-in-the-port-of-savannah-savannah-georgia-news-photo/144072885?adppopup=true">Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.upress.virginia.edu/title/4978">American cities</a> from Atlanta to New York City still use <a href="https://www.salon.com/2017/11/26/how-slave-labor-built-and-financed-major-u-s-cities/">buildings, roads, ports and rail lines</a> built by enslaved people. </p>
<p>The fact that centuries-old relics of slavery still support the economy of the <a href="https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/8/16/20806069/slavery-economy-capitalism-violence-cotton-edward-baptist">United States</a> suggests that <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/anti.12704">reparations for slavery</a> would need to go beyond government payments to the ancestors of enslaved people to account for profit-generating, slave-built infrastructure. </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/from-40-acres-and-a-mule-to-lbj-to-the-2020-election-a-brief-history-of-slavery-reparation-promises-114547">Debates about compensating Black Americans for slavery</a> began soon after the Civil War, in the 1860s, with promises of “40 acres and a mule.” A national conversation about reparations has reignited in recent decades. The <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/06/reparations-definition-2020-candidates/590863/">definition of reparations varies</a>, but most advocates envision it as a two-part reckoning that acknowledges the role slavery played in building the country and directs resources to the <a href="https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/8/16/20806069/slavery-economy-capitalism-violence-cotton-edward-baptist">communities impacted by slavery</a>. </p>
<p>Through our <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=yi48Sl4AAAAJ&hl=en">geographic</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=s4pLMm0AAAAJ&hl=en">urban planning</a> scholarship, we document the contemporary infrastructure created by enslaved Black workers. Our study of what we call the “landscape of race” shows how the globally <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/14/magazine/slavery-capitalism.html">dominant economy of the United States</a> traces directly back to slavery. </p>
<h2>Looking again at railroads</h2>
<p>While difficult to calculate, <a href="https://railroads.unl.edu/views/item/slavery_rr">scholars estimate</a> that much of the physical infrastructure built before 1860 in the American South was built with enslaved labor. </p>
<p>Railways were particularly critical infrastructure. According to “<a href="https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781442262287/The-American-South-A-History-Volume-1-From-Settlement-to-Reconstruction-Fifth-Edition">The American South</a>,” an in-depth history of the region, railroads “offered solutions to the geographic barriers that segmented the South,” including swamps, mountains and rivers. For inland planters needing to get goods to port, trains were “the elemental precondition to better times.”</p>
<p>Our archival research on Montgomery, Alabama, shows that enslaved workers built and maintained the Montgomery Eufaula Railroad. This 81-mile-long railroad, begun in 1859, connected Montgomery to the Central Georgia Line, which served both Alabama’s fertile <a href="https://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/story/money/business/2014/11/07/cotton-dominates-montgomerys-early-history/18634383/">cotton-growing region</a> – cotton picked by enslaved hands – and the textile mills of Georgia. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382777/original/file-20210205-20-1q117t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Sepia-toned lithograph of six Black men and women in sunhats and overalls in a cotton field" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382777/original/file-20210205-20-1q117t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382777/original/file-20210205-20-1q117t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382777/original/file-20210205-20-1q117t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382777/original/file-20210205-20-1q117t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=377&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382777/original/file-20210205-20-1q117t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382777/original/file-20210205-20-1q117t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382777/original/file-20210205-20-1q117t5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Picking cotton outside Savannah, Ga., in 1867.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://lccn.loc.gov/2015650292">Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Eufala Railroad also gave Alabama commercial access to the Port of Savannah. <a href="https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/atlantic-slave-trade-savannah">Savannah was a key cotton and rice</a> trading port, and slavery was integral to the growth of the city. </p>
<p>Today, Savannah’s deep-water port remains one <a href="https://gaports.com/press-releases/savannah-top-port-for-u-s-exports/">of the busiest container ports in the U.S.</a> Among its top exports: cotton. </p>
<p>The Eufala Railroad closed in the 1970s. But the company that funded its construction – Lehman Durr & Co., a prominent Southern cotton brokerage – existed well into the 20th century. </p>
<p>Examining court affidavits and city records located in the Montgomery city archive, we learned the Montgomery Eufaula Railroad Company received US$1.8 million in loans from Lehman Durr & Co. The main backers of Lehman Durr & Co. went on to found Lehman Brothers bank, one of Wall Street’s <a href="https://atlantablackstar.com/2013/08/26/17-major-companies-never-knew-benefited-slavery/">largest investment banks</a> until it collapsed in 2008, in the U.S. financial crisis. </p>
<p><em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.</p>
<p>Slave-built railroads also gave rise to Georgia’s largest city, Atlanta. In the 1830s, Atlanta was the <a href="https://www.atlantaga.gov/visitors/history#:%7E:text=Atlanta%20was%20founded%20in%201837,%2D%2D%20as%20in%20the%20railroad">terminus of a rail line that extended into the Midwest</a>. </p>
<p>Some of these same rail lines still drive Georgia’s economy. According to a <a href="https://www.georgia.org/sites/default/files/wp-uploads/2016/03/2013_Georgia_Logistics_Report-FULL.pdf">2013 state report</a>, railways that went through Georgia in 2012 carried over US$198 billion in agricultural products and raw materials needed for U.S. industry and manufacturing.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382779/original/file-20210205-17-1j3wt4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black and white image of an old train depot" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382779/original/file-20210205-17-1j3wt4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382779/original/file-20210205-17-1j3wt4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382779/original/file-20210205-17-1j3wt4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382779/original/file-20210205-17-1j3wt4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382779/original/file-20210205-17-1j3wt4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382779/original/file-20210205-17-1j3wt4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382779/original/file-20210205-17-1j3wt4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The 1872 Vicksburg & Brunswick Depot, a passenger and freight station in Eufala, served the Eufala and Georgia Central rail lines, among others.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/pnp/habshaer/al/al1300/al1302/photos/193383pv.jpg">Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Rethinking reparations</h2>
<p>Savannah, Atlanta and Montgomery all show how, far from being an artifact of history, as some <a href="https://www.hoover.org/research/case-against-reparations-slavery">critics of reparations suggest</a>, slavery has a tangible presence in the American economy. </p>
<p>And not just in the South. Wall Street, in <a href="https://www.nycurbanism.com/blog/2019/6/18/a-short-history-of-slavery-in-nyc">New York City</a>, is associated with the trading of stocks. But in the 18th century, enslaved people were <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/business-49476247">bought and sold there</a>. Even after New York closed its slave markets, local businesses sold and shipped cotton grown in the slaveholding South.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382616/original/file-20210204-16-hl2pv1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black-and-white lithograph of a wide street lined with large buildings" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382616/original/file-20210204-16-hl2pv1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/382616/original/file-20210204-16-hl2pv1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382616/original/file-20210204-16-hl2pv1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382616/original/file-20210204-16-hl2pv1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382616/original/file-20210204-16-hl2pv1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382616/original/file-20210204-16-hl2pv1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/382616/original/file-20210204-16-hl2pv1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wall Street around 1850.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://nypl.getarchive.net/media/wall-street-faac73">New York Public Library</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Geographic research like ours could inform thinking on monetary reparations by helping to calculate the ongoing financial value of slavery. </p>
<p>Like scholarship drawing the connection between slavery and <a href="https://civilrightstrail.com/attraction/the-legacy-museum-from-enslavement-to-mass-incarceration/">modern mass incarceration</a>, however, our work also suggests that <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/23/business/economy/reparations-slavery.html">direct payments to indviduals</a> cannot truly account for the modern legacy of slavery. It points toward a broader concept of reparations that reflects how slavery is built into the American landscape, still generating wealth.</p>
<p>Such reparations might include government investments in aspects of American life where Black people face disparities. </p>
<p>Last year the city council in Asheville, North Carolina, voted for “reparations in the form of community investment.” <a href="https://apnews.com/article/054c0c9061e168d4a685b71e9bb3aa95">Priorities could include</a> efforts to increase access to affordable housing and boost minority business ownership. Asheville will also explore strategies to close the racial gap in health care. </p>
<p>It is very difficult, perhaps impossible, to calculate the total contemporary economic impact of slavery. But we see recognizing that enslaved men, women and children built many of the <a href="https://notevenpast.org/slavery-and-freedom-in-savannah/">cities</a>, rail lines and ports that fuel the American economy as a necessary part of any such accounting.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/153969/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joshua F.J. Inwood's research was made possible by a grant from Penn State and UC Berkeley. He knocked on doors for Joe Biden's presidential campaign in the 2020 election. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>This research was made possible with research support from the University of California, Berkeley. Anna Livia Brand is affiliated with the Democratic Party and volunteered for the 2020 election. </span></em></p>Geographers are documenting slave-built infrastructure, from railroads to ports, in use today. Such work could influence the reparations debate by showing how slavery still props up the US economy.Joshua F.J. Inwood, Associate Professor of Geography Senior Research Associate in the Rock Ethics Institute, Penn StateAnna Livia Brand, Assistant Professor, University of California, BerkeleyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1491492020-11-08T19:04:42Z2020-11-08T19:04:42Z$34bn and counting – beware cost overruns in an era of megaprojects<p>A <a href="https://grattan.edu.au/report/the-rise-of-megaprojects-counting-the-costs">Grattan Institute report</a> released today finds Australian governments spent A$34 billion, or 21%, more on transport projects completed since 2001 than they first told taxpayers they would. And as we enter the era of megaprojects in Australia, costs continue to blow out.</p>
<p>Transport projects worth A$5 billion or more in today’s money were almost unheard of ten years ago. Today, as the chart below shows, megaprojects make up the bulk of the work under way across the country. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/366955/original/file-20201102-13-1r53xu3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/366955/original/file-20201102-13-1r53xu3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/366955/original/file-20201102-13-1r53xu3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366955/original/file-20201102-13-1r53xu3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366955/original/file-20201102-13-1r53xu3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366955/original/file-20201102-13-1r53xu3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366955/original/file-20201102-13-1r53xu3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366955/original/file-20201102-13-1r53xu3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These megaprojects include <a href="https://www.westconnex.com.au/">WestConnex</a> in Sydney, <a href="https://westgatetunnelproject.vic.gov.au/">West Gate Tunnel</a> in Melbourne and <a href="https://crossriverrail.qld.gov.au/">Cross River Rail</a> in Brisbane. And this is to say nothing of some enormous projects being planned, such as Melbourne’s <a href="https://suburbanrailloop.vic.gov.au/en">Suburban Rail Loop</a>.</p>
<p>We are also hearing calls to add to this bulging pipeline. In June, the transport and infrastructure ministers of all states and territories <a href="https://www.transportinfrastructurecouncil.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/13th-transport-and-infrastructure-council-communique.pdf">said</a> they were “clearing the way for an infrastructure-led recovery” from the COVID-19 recession.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-may-live-to-regret-open-slather-construction-stimulus-139967">We may live to regret open-slather construction stimulus</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Cost overrun risks rise with project size</h2>
<p>The Grattan report, <a href="https://grattan.edu.au/report/the-rise-of-megaprojects-counting-the-costs">The rise of megaprojects: counting the costs</a>, sounds a warning about the risks of this approach. The report uses the <a href="https://www2.deloitte.com/au/en/pages/economics/solutions/investment-monitor.html">Deloitte Access Economics Investment Monitor</a> to look at the final cost of all public road and rail projects worth A$20 million or more and completed since 2001. As the chart below shows, we found bigger projects overran their initial cost estimates more often and by more. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/366959/original/file-20201102-15-1jq716y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/366959/original/file-20201102-15-1jq716y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/366959/original/file-20201102-15-1jq716y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366959/original/file-20201102-15-1jq716y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366959/original/file-20201102-15-1jq716y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366959/original/file-20201102-15-1jq716y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366959/original/file-20201102-15-1jq716y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/366959/original/file-20201102-15-1jq716y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Almost half of the projects with an initial price tag of more than A$1 billion in today’s money had a cost overrun. These projects overran their initial costs by 30% on average. The extra amount spent on some megaprojects was the size of a megaproject itself.</p>
<p>Cost announcements before governments were prepared to commit formally to a project were particularly risky. Only one-third of projects had costs announced prematurely, but these accounted for more than three-quarters of the A$34 billion overrun.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/missing-evidence-base-for-big-calls-on-infrastructure-costs-us-all-99080">Missing evidence base for big calls on infrastructure costs us all</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>When early costings of infrastructure turn out to be too low, it distorts investment planning in three ways:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>underestimating the costs of transport infrastructure can lead to over-investing in it relative to other spending priorities</p></li>
<li><p>if governments misunderstand the uncertainty in a project’s cost at the time they commit to it, their decision to invest in that project was made on an incorrect basis</p></li>
<li><p>because unrealistic cost estimates are more prevalent for larger projects, governments are more likely to over-invest in larger projects. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>There’s also a fourth and no less important problem: when unrealistically low cost estimates are announced, the public is misled.</p>
<p>Despite the experience of the past 20 years, the costs of big projects continue to be underestimated. The chart below shows A$24 billion more than first expected will be spent on just six <em>mega</em> megaprojects (that is, projects with an initial cost estimate of A$5 billion or more) now under construction. Overruns on other megaprojects have been <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/deal-cut-on-metro-tunnel-s-blowout-billions-after-government-cave-in-20201015-p565a5.html">reported</a> too.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367692/original/file-20201105-17-1h1q8ne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367692/original/file-20201105-17-1h1q8ne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/367692/original/file-20201105-17-1h1q8ne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367692/original/file-20201105-17-1h1q8ne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367692/original/file-20201105-17-1h1q8ne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367692/original/file-20201105-17-1h1q8ne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367692/original/file-20201105-17-1h1q8ne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/367692/original/file-20201105-17-1h1q8ne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/transport-promises-for-election-2019-the-good-the-bad-and-the-downright-ugly-115138">Transport promises for election 2019: the good, the bad and the downright ugly</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>What needs to be done?</h2>
<p>With megaproject costs continuing to blow out, governments should take immediate steps to manage better the portfolio of work under way — particularly if they are looking to add to it in the name of economic stimulus. </p>
<p>Each state’s auditor-general should conduct a stocktake of current projects. This would give the public and the government a clear picture of the situation. </p>
<p>Ministers should begin reporting to parliament on a continuous disclosure basis. Any material changes in expected costs, benefits or completion dates of very large projects should be disclosed.</p>
<p>Steps should be taken to put decisions on the incoming batch of projects on a sounder basis, too. When announcing a cost, ministers and government agencies should disclose how advanced the estimate is. If the proposal is at an early stage, they should quote a range of estimates. </p>
<p>Governments should also require their infrastructure advisory bodies to at least assess — if not approve — large proposals before funding is committed.</p>
<p>Looking further ahead, action is needed to stop the pattern of spending billions more than expected on megaprojects. State departments of transport and infrastructure should devote more resources to identifying modest-sized transport infrastructure proposals. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-pm-wants-to-fast-track-mega-projects-for-pandemic-recovery-heres-why-thats-a-bad-idea-136838">The PM wants to fast-track mega-projects for pandemic recovery. Here's why that’s a bad idea</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>And governments need to start learning from the past. Detailed project data, particularly on expected and actual costs, should be centrally collated in each state. </p>
<p>Post-completion reviews should be mandatory on all large projects. These reviews should be published.</p>
<p>If there is no change in the way infrastructure is conceived and delivered in Australia, then the era of the megaproject will indeed mean megaproblems.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/149149/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Grattan Institute began with contributions to its endowment of $15 million from each of the Federal and Victorian Governments, $4 million from BHP Billiton, and $1 million from NAB. In order to safeguard its independence, Grattan Institute’s board controls this endowment. The funds are invested and Grattan uses the income to pursue its activities.</span></em></p>A review of all public road and rail projects worth $20 million or more and completed since 2001 reveals a 21% cost overrun. Worryingly, costs of bigger projects blew out more often and by more.Greg Moran, Senior Associate, Grattan InstituteLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1479622020-10-19T14:56:28Z2020-10-19T14:56:28ZFive innovations that could shape the future of rail travel<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364243/original/file-20201019-21-ijrt3o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/high-speed-fast-train-passenger-locomotive-1189478818">aapsky/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>What will the future of public transport look like? The major projects being planned today, such as the UK’s HS2 high-speed rail network, <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-future-of-rail-travel-and-why-it-doesnt-look-like-hyperloop-45354">aren’t fundamentally different</a> to what’s been built over the last 30 years. Maglev trains are largely confined to niche projects in China. Hyperloop remains an unproven glimmer in Elon Musk and Richard Branson’s eyes.</p>
<p>The likes of HS2 can deliver considerable improvements in network capacity but through incremental changes in conventional designs, from tracks to train bogies. Yet while the rail sector is warily slow at introducing new technologies due to the long time it takes to plan and build new lines and vehicles, there are a number of technical innovations in development that, if adopted, could make the trains of tomorrow both faster and safer.</p>
<h2>1. Mechatronic switches</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Diagram of a railway junction." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364083/original/file-20201018-21-109qtk7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364083/original/file-20201018-21-109qtk7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=119&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364083/original/file-20201018-21-109qtk7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=119&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364083/original/file-20201018-21-109qtk7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=119&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364083/original/file-20201018-21-109qtk7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=149&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364083/original/file-20201018-21-109qtk7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=149&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364083/original/file-20201018-21-109qtk7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=149&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Switch and crossing system.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Saikat Dutta</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Switch or points failure is responsible for nearly <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0954409717727879">20% of the total delay</a> experienced by passengers on UK railways. This occurs when there’s a problem with the mechanism that enables trains to move from one track to another at a junction. Despite the frequency of the problem, the technology used in these mechanisms has hardly changed since the first design nearly 200 years ago.</p>
<p>But a collaborative <a href="http://www.s-code.info/">research project</a> has explored radical alternative technologies. For example, one innovative design <a href="https://www.lboro.ac.uk/news-events/news/2019/march/repoint-track-switch/">called Repoint</a> has three independent motors that can lift and shift the rails, relying on gravity to lock them back into place and providing redundancy in case one or two of the motors fail. </p>
<p>This contrasts with existing switches that slide the rails sideways and can get stuck midway, so have costly additional layers of sensors and protocols to mitigate the risk. The next-generation “mechatronic” switches aim to work faster, improve <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/stoken/default+domain/10.1177%252F0954409719868129/full">ease of maintenance</a> and reduce the risk of failure through their backup motors.</p>
<h2>2. Active suspension</h2>
<p>Conventional suspension systems restrict a train’s speed as it travels on curved track, limiting how many trains you can run on a route. These suspension systems essentially work like large springs, automatically changing the distance between the wheels and the carriage as the train travels over uneven ground to make the ride feel smoother.</p>
<p>Active suspension systems are now being developed which introduce new sensors, actuators and controllers to more precisely alter the distance between wheels and carriage. This offers improved <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1155/2014/298382">ride comfort</a> and enables the train to travel round curves with <a href="https://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2719&context=eispapers">greater speed</a> and <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0020294018819539">stability</a>. This can be combined with systems to actively tilt the train as it rounds the corner, offering increased benefits.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Diagram of two trains from front" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364228/original/file-20201019-13-et6l9s.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364228/original/file-20201019-13-et6l9s.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364228/original/file-20201019-13-et6l9s.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364228/original/file-20201019-13-et6l9s.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=288&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364228/original/file-20201019-13-et6l9s.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364228/original/file-20201019-13-et6l9s.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364228/original/file-20201019-13-et6l9s.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=362&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Active tilting, steering and suspension compared to traditional tilting train.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Saikat Dutta</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>3. Actively steering</h2>
<p>In a conventional wheelset, both wheels are interlocked and connected with a fixed axle, preventing any relative rotation between them. When a train enters a curve or a divergent route at a junction, it must slow down to ensure the wheels are guided over the track and to prevent unwanted vibration of the wheels. </p>
<p>Railway researchers are now developing <a href="https://assets.new.siemens.com/siemens/assets/api/uuid:2dbbe04aeb88674e9b6c332c43d452456b59019e/wheel-sets-independent-en.pdf">independently rotating wheels</a> to include a separate <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/00423114.2020.1780455?casa_token=6d8b5kskcqQAAAAA:sNyxfpE00K9L-z32ZrkTvwC1_e5v8f-7EIuiToyKUsTn-6S078cBBPYagenvbhPw4ZWKl3vW6w">actuation</a> mechanism that can help steer the wheelsets on the curved route.</p>
<h2>4. Active pantograph</h2>
<p>High-speed electric trains need to maintain good contact with the overhead powerlines via the pantograph that sits on top of the vehicle. On the UK mainline, pantograph height usually varies by <a href="http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/103249/1/Overheadline_paper_ICE_accepted_version.pdf">about 2m</a> to secure the connection in different areas such as in tunnels, level crossings and bridges. </p>
<p>Researchers are starting to develop <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0954409717707399">active pantographs</a> that have their height and the induced vibration involved in power transfer controlled by an actuator. These active pantographs can improve the contact force and eliminate contact loss problems due to rapid changes in the overhead line height and other environmental disturbances (such as wind).</p>
<h2>5. Virtual coupling</h2>
<p>The number of trains that can run on a route (and so the capacity of the line) depends in part on the signalling system. Most railways use a fixed-block system, which divides the tracks into sections. Only one train at a time can be in each section so there has to be a significant gap between the trains. </p>
<p>But some railways are now starting to use a <a href="https://blog.bham.ac.uk/bcrre/2020/07/27/the-railway-is-full-how-can-we-increase-its-capacity/">moving-block signalling</a> system, which determines the necessary gap between trains based on the distance it takes for them to come to a stop in an emergency. But this gap could be reduced further if it’s based on real time information about what the train in front is doing and where it will stop if it hits the brakes.</p>
<p>This is known as “<a href="https://movingrail.eu/images/Deliverables/D4.1-MOVINGRAIL_Market-Potential-and-Operational-Scenarios-for-VC-20200707.pdf">virtual coupling</a>” and involves the two trains communicating information about their changing speed and brake activity so that they can decrease or increase the gap between them to the minimum necessary. With <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2210970619300848?via%253Dihub">shorter gaps between them</a>, more trains could run safely on a route, increasing overall network capacity.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two diagrams of train on a track." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364233/original/file-20201019-21-191otov.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364233/original/file-20201019-21-191otov.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=460&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364233/original/file-20201019-21-191otov.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=460&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364233/original/file-20201019-21-191otov.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=460&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364233/original/file-20201019-21-191otov.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=577&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364233/original/file-20201019-21-191otov.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=577&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364233/original/file-20201019-21-191otov.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=577&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Virtual coupling system compared to moving block system.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Saikat Dutta</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>With such innovations, we could introduce trains that are able to adapt to the changing characteristics of the line in order to maintain high speeds throughout most of the journey and avoid those annoying stop-start periods of travel. Widening and disrupting the boundaries of current railway designs in this way would enable us to create a next-generation network with a step-change in performance that is fit for the 21st century – without any need for expensive levitating trains or vaccum tubes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/147962/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Saikat Dutta is affiliated with Institution of Mechanical Engineers. </span></em></p>Hyperloop might still be a dream but new technologies promise to make trains faster and safer.Saikat Dutta, Research Fellow in Railway Mechatronics Systems, University of BirminghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1406632020-06-18T15:06:38Z2020-06-18T15:06:38Z‘The Night Trains’: a masterly study into southern Africa’s murderous migrant system<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/341546/original/file-20200612-153827-r8mb08.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It would be a truism to say that the functions of trains in modern history have been diverse and multifarious. Steam engines were drivers of the British industrial revolution, and the motors of internal westward expansion in North America. Railways were instruments of imperial expansion, as exemplified in Cecil Rhodes’ Cape-to-Cairo fantasy, and instruments of extermination, carrying Holocaust victims to their awful fate. </p>
<p>A railway map of South Africa reveals much about the course of the country’s economic history since the 1880s, with lines converging on the Rand, the industrial and mining metropolis. Meanwhile rural branch lines were constructed to serve the interests of white capitalist farmers, totally excluding the needs of black rural areas.</p>
<p>Trains can also be indicators of inequality. The Blue Train provides luxury travel for those who can afford it, while the Phelophepa Train – a mobile clinic – provides basic healthcare across the country for those who cannot afford it.</p>
<p>In his impressive <a href="http://www.jonathanball.co.za/component/virtuemart/the-night-trains"><em>The Night Trains</em></a><em>: Moving Mozambican Miners to and from South Africa, 1902-1955</em>, historian Charles van Onselen provides a grim account of trains as instruments of brutalisation and dehumanisation. He tells the story of the trains that transported migrant workers from Mozambique to the Rand mines and back during the first five or so decades of the twentieth century – journeys that Van Onselen describes as ‘mobile incarceration’. </p>
<p>It is a harrowing story, narrated with both compassion and elegance. The railway from Delagoa Bay to the Rand opened in 1895. Initially it was built for the purpose of transporting heavy equipment and other goods required for mining operations. After the South African War the British-controlled Transvaal administration came to an agreement with the Portuguese colonial government in Mozambique. Under it the recruiting agency, the Witwatersrand Native Labour Association, was granted exclusive access to black Mozambican labour. For their part the Portuguese were given a guaranteed share of rail traffic routed through Lourenço Marques. </p>
<p>It was a trade-off – rail traffic in exchange for human traffic. When the trains first started carrying Mozambican migrant workers they were still purposed only to carry freight. This meant that the migrants themselves were initially conveyed as such, treated no better than goods, or as animals transported in cattle trucks. In time some effort was made to view the migrants as human passengers. For example, third-class ‘native coaches’ were introduced. But as late as the 1920s the workers might still have to travel part of the journey in open coal trucks, even during the cold of winter.</p>
<p>The attainment of ‘passenger’ status by no means ended the degradation and dehumanisation that characterised the lengthy journey – the up-train to the Rand taking about 20 hours. The down-train took slightly fewer. The overcrowded carriages were locked to prevent migrants jumping off and deserting. There were minimal ablution facilities on the trains, an insufficient provision of water, and meagre food rations, often comprising little more than dry bread. </p>
<p>Such was the extent of the exploitation, and the extreme indignity accompanying it, that the migrants had to pay their own rail fares – a cost amounting to about 17 days of earnings on the mines. While the journey to and from the mines was arduous, the underground work itself was even more onerous and dangerous. Mine owners and managers had little regard for health and safety considerations. This gave rise to a high death rate from accidents, pneumonia, TB and silicosis. </p>
<p>Between 1902 and 1912 it was estimated that about 50,000 workers died from various causes associated with mine labour. Van Onselen succinctly summarises how the Mozambicans</p>
<blockquote>
<p>were – at various points or times and with varying degrees of intensity and urgency – assaulted, corralled, disciplined, deprived, documented, examined, fed, fingerprinted, guided, incarcerated, marched, measured, marshalled, questioned, searched, raided and released by black and white men in uniform. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>And, he continues, this whole degrading process was carried out in such a way that it was invisible to the white minority whose privilege and prosperity rested in part on the profitability and success of the mining industry. Workers were</p>
<blockquote>
<p>recruited out of sight, delivered to the industrial centres invisibly, and then made to disappear into the darkness of the underground workings of the mines before being smuggled back home, also unseen, in the middle of the night.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This masterly study shows how the mining industry and the railway system combined to maximise the exploitation of cheap Mozambican migrant labour to ensure the profitability of the industry. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/341534/original/file-20200612-153808-o7wfl6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/341534/original/file-20200612-153808-o7wfl6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/341534/original/file-20200612-153808-o7wfl6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/341534/original/file-20200612-153808-o7wfl6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=902&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/341534/original/file-20200612-153808-o7wfl6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1133&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/341534/original/file-20200612-153808-o7wfl6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1133&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/341534/original/file-20200612-153808-o7wfl6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1133&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jonathan Ball Publishers</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Up till the 1930s Mozambicans made up over half of the migrant labour force on the gold mines. A combination of rural poverty at home, a coercive labour recruiting system, and an obliging Portuguese colonial administration drove these migrants to South Africa’s mining metropolis, where they were treated merely as expendable units of labour and not as human beings. The degrading transport system that took these workers to this dangerous, life-threatening, underground toil was an essential component of this whole exploitative order that stands as yet another shameful element in South Africa’s past.</p>
<p><em><a href="http://www.jonathanball.co.za/component/virtuemart/the-night-trains">The Night Trains</a>: Moving Mozambican Miners to and from South Africa, circa 1902-1955, by Charles van Onselen (Jonathan Ball, 2019) 247pp.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/140663/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Maylam does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A devastating historical exposé of South Africa’s mining industry and the railway system that maximised the exploitation of cheap Mozambican labour.Paul Maylam, Emeritus Professor, Rhodes UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1376722020-06-15T13:24:02Z2020-06-15T13:24:02ZWith construction paused, let’s rethink roads and railway projects to protect people and nature<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/333177/original/file-20200506-49579-1ri6m8r.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C494%2C4019%2C2523&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Mongu-Kalabo Road crosses the Barotse Floodplain in western Zambia.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Charis Enns</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta fumed at construction delays on the <a href="http://www.lapsset.go.ke/">Lamu Port-South Sudan-Ethiopia Transport Corridor</a> in 2019 – a US$22 billion (£18 billion) transport network that includes a 32-berth port, highways, railways and pipelines. But these delays, caused by financing gaps, afforded fishers, pastoral farmers and conservationists time to <a href="https://www.theelephant.info/op-eds/2018/05/05/a-civic-action-on-the-lapsset-corridor/">challenge the project in court</a>, and push for <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03066150.2017.1377185">amended plans</a> that better protect local habitats and migratory routes used by people, livestock and wildlife.</p>
<p>While major road and rail projects often break up wilderness and grazing lands, a sudden pause in construction can offer a lifeline to people fighting to protect these areas. </p>
<p>Lockdown restrictions and the uncertainty caused by COVID-19 have made sourcing labour and materials more difficult, increasing construction costs. The result is that infrastructure building has <a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/heavy-construction-industry-outlook-near-121812221.html">slowed globally</a>, creating a unique opportunity to redesign road and rail projects around the world so that they benefit the people and environments they share the landscape with. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cars-transition-from-lockdown-is-a-fork-in-the-road-here-are-two-possible-outcomes-for-future-travel-139885">Cars: transition from lockdown is a fork in the road – here are two possible outcomes for future travel</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Barriers to travel</h2>
<p>Dozens of new roads, railways and pipelines are under construction in sub-Saharan Africa due to a surge in investment in recent years. Although they are promised to bolster economic growth, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0016718517303299?casa_token=NJKIAzIw3UIAAAAA:r8cz8sOVnvz6pbcIhmw-bQ4zdPbtlYunhmDJ9ktQYcN9bron82PKcVXrlu1oieoIG83QR5gbRw">our research</a> shows that many of these new mega-highways and high-speed rail lines were approved without meaningful consultation between planners and local people. As a result, they tend to become new barriers that are <a href="https://theconversation.com/massive-african-infrastructure-projects-often-hurt-rather-than-help-local-people-132699">difficult and dangerous to traverse</a>, forcing people to travel long distances to reach safe crossing points. </p>
<p>In dry regions, this can make it difficult to reach vital water sources. Amid farmland and forests, construction can push people from their land or force them to travel further to reach it. Deforestation usually comes before construction too, which encourages people to migrate further into woodland, building new settlements that drive more forest clearing.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/333161/original/file-20200506-49579-1nbblqo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/333161/original/file-20200506-49579-1nbblqo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333161/original/file-20200506-49579-1nbblqo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333161/original/file-20200506-49579-1nbblqo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333161/original/file-20200506-49579-1nbblqo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333161/original/file-20200506-49579-1nbblqo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333161/original/file-20200506-49579-1nbblqo.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Forest is cleared to make way for road construction in central Tanzania.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Charis Enns</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Poorly designed roads and rail lines can take a heavy toll on human and animal life. During our research between 2017 and 2019, we found too few safe crossing points, inadequate signage and lax speed enforcement along new highways and railways in Kenya and Tanzania, resulting in numerous <a href="https://online.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/10.3828/idpr.2020.7">road accidents</a>. </p>
<p>Conservationists are particularly worried by growing roadkill sightings along a new highway in northern Kenya. Endemic and endangered species like <a href="https://www.awf.org/wildlife-conservation/grevys-zebra">the Grevy’s zebra</a> are often killed in collisions with cars and lorries after wandering onto roads that now criss-cross their range. As one pastoral farmer living alongside the new highway <a href="https://ecommons.aku.edu/eastafrica_eai/27/">exclaimed</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>How many animals have died? Uncountable.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>The alternative</h2>
<p>Fortunately, there are lots of proven strategies for preventing transport projects from fragmenting habitats, such as building passages across new highways and railways that migratory species can use. Repairing environmental damage caused by construction, by filling in quarries that produce construction materials, for example, can also help restore grazing land for livestock and wildlife. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338606/original/file-20200529-78858-zr05gb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338606/original/file-20200529-78858-zr05gb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338606/original/file-20200529-78858-zr05gb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338606/original/file-20200529-78858-zr05gb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338606/original/file-20200529-78858-zr05gb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338606/original/file-20200529-78858-zr05gb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338606/original/file-20200529-78858-zr05gb.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">One of many quarries dug during construction of the Central Corridor in Tanzania.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Brock Bersaglio</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Mongu-Kalabo road constructed over the Barotse floodplain in western Zambia shows these ideas in action. Completed in 2016, the road was built with 26 bridges over the floodplains and regular culverts between bridges, allowing water and wildlife to move across the floodplain without impeding road traffic and trade, even during seasonal floods. </p>
<p>The road was also planned with local cultures in mind. Wetland livelihoods, such as fishing and floodplain farming, aren’t affected by the road since the regular movement of fish and water remains largely undisturbed. By maintaining these flows across the floodplain, cultural traditions have been protected. The annual Kuomboka ceremony that takes place at the end of the rainy season can continue, when the Litunda (king of the Lozi people) moves from his compound in the Barotse floodplain to higher ground.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/333143/original/file-20200506-49589-7ljs37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/333143/original/file-20200506-49589-7ljs37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/333143/original/file-20200506-49589-7ljs37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333143/original/file-20200506-49589-7ljs37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333143/original/file-20200506-49589-7ljs37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333143/original/file-20200506-49589-7ljs37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333143/original/file-20200506-49589-7ljs37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/333143/original/file-20200506-49589-7ljs37.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A bridge in the Mongu-Kalabo road, built over the Barotse floodplain in western Zambia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Charis Enns</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There is no single blueprint for building roads and railways that allow humans and nature to thrive. Wherever construction is planned, <a href="https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/business/article/2001287969/communities-along-lapsset-project-want-a-bigger-say">public participation</a> is vital. Gathering the knowledge local people have of their environment can improve the design of these projects, but this insight cannot come from rushed consultations or impact assessments conducted from a distance. Only meaningful and ongoing engagement with local communities and environmental authorities will do.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/normananderson/2020/06/09/the-mighty-effort-to-save-the-36-trillion-global-infrastructure-market/#2b1b7b3864fc">Major infrastructure investment</a> will likely be key to pulling the global economy out of recession. The opportunity to mould upcoming projects won’t last forever, so let’s ensure any new road and rail project is designed with respect to the rights of people and nature.</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263883/original/file-20190314-28475-1mzxjur.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=176&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/imagine-newsletter-researchers-think-of-a-world-with-climate-action-113443?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=Imagineheader1137672">Click here to subscribe to our climate action newsletter. Climate change is inevitable. Our response to it isn’t.</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/137672/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charis Enns receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brock Bersaglio receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alex Awiti does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Road and rail construction is booming in sub-Saharan Africa, but the pandemic has brought a welcome pause for reflection.Charis Enns, Presidential Fellow in Socio-Environmental Systems, University of ManchesterAlex Awiti, Director, East African Institute, Aga Khan University Brock Bersaglio, Lecturer in Environment and Development, University of BirminghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1386482020-05-20T12:49:07Z2020-05-20T12:49:07ZHow coronavirus could usher in a new ‘golden age’ of rail travel<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336489/original/file-20200520-152338-ah84zv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=146%2C249%2C5569%2C3572&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Don't worry, we're not going back to steam.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/bury-lancashire-june-2010-world-famous-1556389715">Shutterstock/KarlWeller</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Quietly, outside of the public gaze, a revolution has started on Britain’s railways. On March 23, COVID-19 destroyed the railway industry as it had existed for the past 25 years. As concerns about virus transmission grew, passenger numbers <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6659458363321135106/">reduced by 80%</a> before the official lockdown even began. The private companies running train services were broke and the UK government <a href="https://www.railwaygazette.com/uk/uk-train-operators-offered-management-contracts-or-nationalisation/56083.article">took control</a>, effectively bringing an end to the <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/rail-review-chair-says-franchising-cannot-continue-in-its-current-form">failed franchise model</a>. As <a href="http://e-space.mmu.ac.uk/622773/">our research has shown</a>, services have to be capable to survive – even in the best of times.</p>
<p>Many organisations, such as the Railway Safety and Standards Board (RSSB) <a href="https://www.rssb.co.uk/Insights-and-News/Latest-Updates/RSSB-sets-out-goals-for-the-next-12-months">stated that</a> COVID-19 was a temporary blip to the ongoing success of the railways. But more economically informed parts of the transport industry know that this is not the case. Even the chief executive of Network Rail, Andrew Haines, <a href="https://www.railbusinessdaily.com/andrew-haines-life-in-charge-of-running-britains-railways/">believes</a> the UK is “at a time of industry change”.</p>
<p>As Haines points out there is an opportunity for investment and to reshape the industry, just as the government had planned to do over 30 years from 2012. The <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXlve-3Q_fY">Rail Technical Stategy</a> envisaged seamless digital ticketing and an end to checking tickets before you get in a train, be that people or machines, which force people closer together. It’s worth noting that a rail ticket has remained fairly unchanged since it was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmondson_railway_ticket">invented by Thomas Edmondson</a> in the 1840s. New digital ticketing is more akin to a mobile phone or pay-as-you-go and <a href="https://maas-alliance.eu/homepage/what-is-maas/">covers all your transport needs</a> from bikes, trains, taxis and beyond. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336376/original/file-20200520-152315-pmmacs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336376/original/file-20200520-152315-pmmacs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=324&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336376/original/file-20200520-152315-pmmacs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=324&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336376/original/file-20200520-152315-pmmacs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=324&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336376/original/file-20200520-152315-pmmacs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336376/original/file-20200520-152315-pmmacs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336376/original/file-20200520-152315-pmmacs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A cheap day ticket from the 1930s.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edmondson_railway_ticket#/media/File:LMS_Saltley_to_Birmingham_New_Street_third_class_cheap_day_railway_ticket.jpg">Wikimedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Other innovations required by the strategy include trains running when they were needed, rather than to a fixed timetable, to help ensure passengers had the least crowded trains possible. This is a world where the customer – rather than operational convenience – is at the heart of the rail transport strategy. </p>
<p>But what would it cost? The <a href="https://rssb.wavecast.io/datasandbox/rts-capability-delivery-plan">delivery plan</a> calculated that these innovations and changes would actually save the rail industry between £1bn and £1.6bn per year, if fully implemented. That is why we believe that now is the time to start implementing this strategy. But instead of delivery in 30 years, it should be brought online within three. </p>
<p>The reason for such urgency is obvious. After two months of lockdown and despite the spectre of COVID-19 remaining, it seems unlikely that everyone will start working from their offices again. The Rail Delivery Group’s weekly COVID-19 summary stated on May 7 that the average time before people plan to take a train again is 4.5 months, versus 3.8 months for buses, with 62% of the public flatly refusing to use trains until social distancing is in place.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336087/original/file-20200519-152344-175rbpr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336087/original/file-20200519-152344-175rbpr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336087/original/file-20200519-152344-175rbpr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336087/original/file-20200519-152344-175rbpr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336087/original/file-20200519-152344-175rbpr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336087/original/file-20200519-152344-175rbpr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336087/original/file-20200519-152344-175rbpr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Could overcrowded stations be a thing of the past? Waterloo Station, 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/london-december-2017-very-crowded-train-771044566">Shutterstock/WillyBarton</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Even if a vaccine is delivered, the transport patterns of society will be <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52414376">forever altered</a> – enabled by the digital revolution in the home which is now enabling massive levels of home-working and less need to travel into an office.</p>
<h2>The future of public transport</h2>
<p>So from now on, what is likely is <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/05/09/trains-will-90-per-cent-empty-lockdown-government-announces/">occasional travel by most</a> and predominantly low demand. The industry does not yet know what this will look like. Accurate economic modelling for this scenario does not exist. But some basic assumptions can be made based on what we know or can best guess.</p>
<p>We took a look at London’s Thameslink trains and applied some basic <a href="https://www.wiley.com/en-gb/Essential+Guide+to+Operations+Management%3A+Concepts+and+Case+Notes-p-9780470685396">capacity planning</a>. Each of these trains was designed to carry more than 1,000 people, just under half of whom <a href="http://www.railtechnologymagazine.com/Rail-Industry-Focus-/on-board-the-class-700">would be seated</a>. The carriages offer 688 square meters of passenger space – or put another way, 0.7 square meters per person. If you now allow for two square meters per passenger – to achieve social distancing – the new capacity of the very same carriages is just 172 people.</p>
<p>This optimistically equates to 20% of current passenger capacity, so to reduce the risk of COVID-19 infection commuters will only be able to travel one day in five. This is further complicated because 22% of the UK workforce are <a href="https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/14763">key workers</a>. So if they travel by public transport all the capacity will be taken up. But that’s not realistic, so let’s assume three-quarters of them use the trains in London. That would only allow other workers to travel to their place of work one day in ten. </p>
<h2>Back to the 1860s</h2>
<p>We could be entering another golden age of railway travel. One in which passengers actually have space around them to relax and perhaps even work. This would see railway passenger levels returning to those <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/4203/realising-the-potential-of-gb-rail-summary.pdf">experienced between 1960 and 1999</a> of around 750 million annual journeys – much lower than the 2020 peak of 1,800 million. Current travel may be as low as 200 million per year, which was last experienced in the 1860s.</p>
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<p><a href="https://orr.gov.uk/rail/publications/economic-regulation-publications/uk-rail-industry-financial-information/uk-rail-industry-financial-information-2018-19">Ticket sales</a> in 2018/2019 were £10.4bn a year which was topped up with £4.1bn of government subsidy. But the cost to the taxpayer is now set to massively increase to make up for the lost passenger revenue – which we estimate could drop to as low as £2bn per year. That leaves a gaping £8bn hole.</p>
<p>Railways costs are mainly driven by items that don’t fluctuate with demand and are based on a very high fixed cost. So railways will continue to cost around £14bn without a massive reorganisation. It is clear then, that a new golden age will certainly come with a hefty price in terms of extra taxpayers’ money, even assuming the whole railway technical strategy is delivered rapidly. </p>
<p>Network Rail will need to coordinate and deliver railway services in increasingly agile ways. For example, by using “dynamic timetabling” where trains operate on a turn up and go basis – like urban buses or <a href="https://hrcak.srce.hr/file/122058">some metro systems</a>). This will enable the rail industry to create an effective and efficient new system. And if that new system focuses more on the commuter, then train journeys might one day be something people actually look forward to.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138648/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The UK cannot wait 30 years for a modern rail network.Marcus Mayers, Visiting Research Fellow, Manchester Metropolitan UniversityDavid Bamford, Professor of Operations Management, Manchester Metropolitan UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.