Metrorail: The Rail Disaster

Cape Town mayoral committee member for safety and security, JP Smith summed up the city’s embattled rail infrastructure as: “People talk as if Prasa [Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa] must still collapse. It has already collapsed.”

Once upon a time Metrorail was the backbone of transportation in the Western Cape.

No longer is the rail company the prime mover of most of those who contribute towards the economy in the province.

Commuters are subjected to daily train cancellations and, for those fortunate to get a train, it is almost always delayed.

Multiple factors contribute to the frustrating situation.

Most delays are due to obsolete infrastructure, the result of decades of disinvestment in passenger rail.

To make matters worse, there are daily incidents of vandalism and, since October 2015, there have been frequent train-related fire incidents.

“Commuters no longer depend on Metrorail because the failures of the rail agency are forcing them to make use of their own alternative transport,” said Dan Plato, Cape Town’s Mayor in waiting.

In January, Prasa went as far as to admit the system had derailed and that it was unable to guarantee a safe journey to commuters.

Fast forward 10 months to the beginning of October, and the Rail Safety Regulator (RSR) issued a suspension notice to Prasa which read: “Prasa Rail cannot demonstrate confidence to the RSR that it has the ability, commitment and resources to properly assess and effectively control the risks arising from its railway operation – to the detriment of the safety of those who may be affected by its railway operations.”

Two days later, Prasa dragged the RSR to court in a bid to stop the regulator’s intention to cancel train operations. In a supervisory order, Prasa was told by the Pretoria North Court to “stick to the safety requirements of the RSR or end up being cancelled”.

Judge Cassim Sadiwalla said: “This is a case of national importance. Prasa is responsible for creating a safe rail environment for employees and commuters.”

This reiterates a 2015 Constitutional Court ruling that Prasa had an obligation to protect commuters from any form of incident.

The directive by the RSR relates to the every-increasing number of manual authorizations of trains. This means Prasa’s maintenance management is not improving.

Prasa spokesperson Nana Zenani said: “At least 33% - or 165 488 – of the manual authorization incidents in the country are because of vandalism of signal equipment and cable theft”.

In terms of the court order, Prasa is obliged to give monthly written progress feedback to the RSR and the judge. The rail operator may also not deploy or use new rolling stock without prior approval by the RSR.

Furthermore, a comprehensive integrated asset condition assessment report – for all of Prasa’s railway infrastructure – needs to be handed over to the RSR by March 2019.

Metrorail Western Cape spokesperson Riana Scott was initially not keen to respond to a list of questions regarding train operations, security and customer communication, and their direct effect on commuters, staff and stakeholders.

Zenani referred all questions on the state of Metrorail Western Cape to the regional manager, Richard Walker.

“The operational responsibility in the Western Cape is with Walker and his team. They should account for operational matters.”

After doing so, Scott said: “Re-signalling for the Cape Flats Line and Southern Line between Salt River and Fish Hoek is complete. Central and North have yet to commence.”

When asked about plans to start on the other lines, Scott said she could only respond with the information she had available.

Walker, in August, told members of the media re-signalling for Central Line would start later this year to early 2019 and North between late 2019 and mid-2020.

On the effects of re-signalling, Scott explained: “Experience has shown the inadvertent impact of migration to new technologies has sporadic service system failures as part of commissioning and testing new technology.”

This, together with old infrastructure has largely contributed to major service disruptions.

At this stage there is no due date for completion.

While Metrorail and Prasa have yet to admit as much, frequent commuter experience has shown that until upgrades have been completed, commuters are in for a long tough ride.

Customer communication – the one thing Metrorail can control – does not seem to be a priority. This is also evident from the hundreds of complaints you read on social media.

In August 2017, Walker admitted to members of the Western Cape provincial legislature’s standing committee on transport that “Metrorail is not communicating enough with commuters.”

In February 2018, Prasa group executives told members of the parliamentary portfolio committee on transport “Commuters would be happy with more communication.”

According to Scott: “Customer concerns are assessed, and efforts are made to educate, elaborate on and explain issues.”

Like her boss, Scott concede that many complaints relate to lack of communication.

“Trains have no on-board announcement capability,” she said. “This leaves Metrorail reliant on SMSes, via an external service provider, on social media and on centralised announcements.”

Scott added not all stations have operable announcements systems.

“Stations with operable systems can make local announcements and loudhailers are available to be used at stations by staff.”

She further explains: “As modern systems replace outdated ones the integration of information is often temporarily not possible. Like information on electronic display boards often misaligned to real operating conditions during service interruptions.

Plato, who attempted to catch a train this week from Mitchells Plain to Cape Town station to experience first-hand what train commuters are subjected to, said: “Until problems at top level are not resolved, it is commuters who will continue to suffer because of a lack of action.”

In February, Economic Freedom Fighters MP, Nontando Nolutshungu, told Prasa: “Commuters only want to know how you take them to work or home and what are you doing if trains are cancelled.  There should be a simple plan.”

DA MP, Manny de Freitas, was less diplomatic, saying “Prasa has no clue what is happening on their tracks. This justify the frustration amongst commuters”

Transport portfolio committee chairperson, Dikiledi Magadzi said: “Commuters hanging on trains are torture and Prasa officials are not realistic when talking about modernisation plans.”

Apart from all the vandalism Metrorail Western Cape has since October 2015 lost half their trains sets in train fire incidents. To date train carriages lost in fire incidents in 2018:

4 on 22 Mei at Retreat 2 on 30 Mei at Ottery 3 on 18 Junie at Steenberg 2 on 25 Junie at Philippi 7 on 21 July at Cape Town 5 on 26 July at Retreat 2 on 28 July at Cape Town 2 on 21 August at Koeberg 5 on 28 September at Dal Josaphat 2 on 28 September at Firgrove 1 on 28 September at Cape Town 8 on 9 October at Cape Town

In the Ottery incident Leigh Jansen sustained third degree burnt wounds. A 35-year old female commuter, originally from the Eastern Cape, died in the fire. She was not the only train fire casualty.

In January 2016 navy cadet Gerald Gouws died in a train fire at Glencairn. It took DNA-test two months to confirm the identity of the 23-year old from Uitenhage in the Eastern Cape.

It remains a mystery who is behind the suspected arson attack at Metrorail. All stakeholders agree it is a well-orchestrated plan to destroy rail transportation.

In July while visiting torched carriages transport minister dr. Blade Nzimande said: “Prasa spends thousands on security but there is no value for money.

He declared the rail operator in the province a priority, but since then more carriages went up in flames and no plans implemented.

Magadzi is more frustrated that there is no movement at Prasa and said: “It is a concern that Prasa receives money to improve security, but it is not used for that. There is just no improvement.

Commuters want to know how is it that trains burn, even with a security presence on platforms.

In the province, Metrorail has only 1845 security officials. Of these,789 are employed by Prasa; the rest are contracted security.

These include officials who do special investigations, administrative duties, staff on leave and/or training.

In support of these officers, a joint project by the city, the Western Cape government and Prasa was meant to be launched this week. There was, however, a twist: The deployment of the City’s rail unit was delayed as it was still awaiting permission to operate on Prasa infrastructure.

Cape Town mayoral committee member for transport Brett Herron sum up how commuters feel: “To travel the way thousands of train commuters do daily is unimaginable. The conditions are horrifying… In my opinion unconstitutional!”

This is an unedited version of an article originally published in City Press on Sunday 21 October 2018