Israel Railways CEO Yitzhak Harel wants to sell the Danish-build carriages of the type that burned in last week's train fire. In an interview following the fire, he said that instead of renovating the carriages, the company would sell them and procure alternative rolling stock.
The idea that anyone would want to buy the fire-prone carriages, as the seller describes them, is risible in itself. Moreover, it sounds like one of Harel's old joke about an Israeli who buys a new car every year because couldn’t be bothered to take it the garage for its annual service.
Israel Railways put the 144 Danish carriages into service in the early 1990s. The carriages have a 40-year lifespan, which means that they are now middle aged. However, the global norm does not apply to Israel; Israel Railways, burdened under heavy passenger traffic, decides that it can forgo a third of its rolling stock, and poor and small as it may be, decides to buy new carriages at a cost of hundreds of millions of shekels, rather than upgrading current carriages for a tenth of the cost.
The answer to the conundrum is apparently a wish to exploit the incident to get a fat check from the Ministry of Finance to procure new rolling stock. Has anyone mentioned the Carmel fire? We can only hope that before the minister of finance signs the check, he will get answers from Harel to the following questions: Why hasn’t Israel Railways taken normal measure to upgrade its mid-life carriages? Has Harel previously asked for such budgets and been refused? Would such an upgrade prevent future accidents of the kind that happened last week?
The Ministry of Finance may get answers from Harel, but the public will apparently have to wait for the results of Israel Railways' internal investigation into the fire. Experience leaves little room for hope. So long as Israel Railways investigates itself, the public has every room to assume that everything will remain as is. Israel Railways will have fewer carriages, but at least their average age will be less than half the global norm. That, too, would be a relief.
Israel Railways said in response, "600 carriages of this model were manufactured, and they are in use in Denmark, Sweden, and Israel. Israel Railways' rolling stock undergoes all the tests and service required by the manufacturer. Nonetheless, this is rolling stock whose use is diminishing, and both Sweden and Denmark are considering taking them out of service. Its replacement with new rolling stock would provide better service for passengers."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on January 2, 2011
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