Re: Driven By Customer 'Service' Parte Dos
(I've forgotten) Were Kawasakis available? How much more would they have cost?
I don't know if the runner-up bids were publicized. But it kind of doesn't matter at this point, because the Rotems need so much after-the-fact fixes and have such poor odds of surviving to a rebuild like the 22-year-old Kawasakis are getting now that they're going to take a bath on them through the vehicles' lifespan. It's same with the Bredas...there's nothing low about a low bid when the manufacturer doesn't know what the fuck they're doing and the vehicles have such iffy build quality they project to having truncated lifespans.
Pretty much all bi-level coaches in North America save for Amtrak's Superliners and Chicago Metra's gallery car design are near-exact copies of Bombardier's
BiLevel design that's been around since 1976. The Kawasakis are so nearly identical they've practically a second-source Bombardier supplier. In addition to our 3 different K car orders (1991, 1998, and 2002) of 120 total, MARC has 63 identical Kawasakis. The Rotems are copies, too, except for some of the more unorthodox small mods cited in the article and more suspect overall craftsmanship. These things are not hard to produce with 38 years of perfected, near-bulletproof service under belt on this design. And more importantly it's pretty hard for any competent vendor to fuck up with as much rinky-dink stuff as this.
Employees on RR.net confirm that the option orders have been formally declined. So 75 cars is it. We are now left with a net reduction in restroom-equipped coaches, because the Rotems don't have restrooms in the rear cab cars like the MBB single-levels they're replacing do...only the blind coaches. That was an explicit design choice to avoid losing too many seats in the rear cars that they thought they'd be able to make up for on the options. Now they are at risk of either having to cut restrooms from some trains, or send some of the 27-year-old MBB's out for yet another band-aid rebuild.
And this royally messes up the 2020 procurements that were going to purge the last of the single-levels because they now have to replace 160 Bombardier and Pullman singles + fleet expansion instead of half that. The DMU's aren't displacing any push-pull equipment because that's additional--not replacement--equipment everywhere except Fairmount. So the money they have to set aside for that 2020 order is now the largest commuter rail procurement in the agency's history. Which seriously ups the odds that we'll be riding the single-levels more years past expiration date and have a re-flare of the same reliability problems that were dragging down the coach fleet the last few years. While chewing up tens of millions on more short-term fixes and mini-rehabs that should've been banked for long-term replacements instead.
There are no used bi-levels to buy and rebuild. Metrolink's, Tri-Rail's, and GO Transit's superseded Bombardier Bi's are all in the non-Northeast low-platform door configuration that requires too radical carbody surgery to retrofit for high-platform compatibility. And no Northeastern operator has been using compatible bi's anywhere close to as long as the T has, so there is no surplus to be had. Plenty of aftermarket single-levels, especially NJ Transit Comet cars...but all of those would have to get the same overhauls as the T could/would do to its own old fleets.
The option orders were critical for setting the table for getting caught up and staying caught up on fleet state-of-repair. Now the only way to stave off a truly daunting 2020 decision (which could get equally fucked up if they don't learn from their low-bid and overcustomization repeat mistakes) is to take the bath and re-bid for some Kawasakis or Bombardiers built to the same spec as the Kawasaki rebuilds. i.e. same ASA as the Rotems, auto doors on all cars with controls for selective-opening them, the new bike rack configuration...but otherwise just a rehash of the old reliables. And the funding commitment for that has to be guaranteed, and we'd have to hold our breath that it doesn't cannibalize the size of the DMU fleet.
Total debacle.
And if the FRA is sticking its nose in this, Hyundai-Rotem may be finished as a U.S. commuter rail manufacturer at the conclusion of all their current orders. SEPTA had all sorts of problems with the Silverliner V EMU's that have only now been stabilized, and had an even nastier bout of legal saber-rattling with them than the T did. Truly "WTF?" sloppy stuff like screws being haphazardly drilled in the wrong places puncturing electrical boxes and shorting out the wiring. Quite unlikely Rotem's going to be allowed to bid on their next order of Silverliner replacements, which will be twice the size of the V's. Also relegating those Rotems to a minority fleet that probably won't age well or live to see a rebuild. Tri-Rail in Florida had the same problems with extremely late deliveries on their bi-levels, with the requisite barking about contract penalties, although they've worked out OK in-service. L.A. Metrolink is less-than-impressed with their bi-levels' build quality with riders and employees saying they feel less-solid than the Bombardier Bi's they're replacing. Similar questions to how well those things are going to age. This was the company's first foray into this market, and they totally shit the bed on it. Their only hope now is that Denver's Silverliner-clone EMU's prove to be enough of a winner that they stay in the
xMU game and can still get a bid seriously considered everywhere else except burnt-bridge SEPTA. They blew it bad enough on coaches that they may well be in-and-out of that market in 5 years flat.
And BTW...Pesaturo and the officials are being more impotent than usual in their "everything's fine...nothing to see here" denials. Employees going rogue to the papers is a bad development. The unions protesting about their employees being held to performance metrics they can't achieve maintaining this crap is a very bad development. The FRA taking notice is a very, very bad development. And you can follow the Rotem thread stickied at the top of the MBTA forum on RR.net (last dozen-plus pages or so) to get independent confirmation of all this. There's about 4 employees prominently featured in that thread who are...particularly brutal...in their assessment of the cars and frustrated enough to push the envelope in what complaints they'll voice in a public forum. So these are not lone disgruntled staffers taking advantage of an unfavorable Globe story to pile on old grievances...there's a lot of frustration in the ranks at BET over the crap they've been handed.
