First rule of journalism - Verify and verify your information.
Lets start with the fact that the current century old railway line has been leased to RVR for 25 years. Gov was spending 500 million monthly on wages a month on a white elephant. It was rushed for privatization just to save treasury from that huge wage bill. So any work that is need to upgrade it should be from RVR not government. I also highly doubt that even the civil works will cost just 16 billion let alone the track. Replacing all bridges, intersections and tunnels…let him publish a bill of quantities first. Below is the rebuttal.
I’m doing my best to see the merit in this article, but the number of inaccuracies & postulation makes the article read like pure slander. That’s not to say there aren’t risks & faults in the projects cited, but all of African’s rail projects are dubious? really? The article could have gone after so many other credible issues regarding the rail projects, but the issues mentioned in the article just don’t stand up.
Quote:Although only a year remains before completion, not only are tariffs and rates undecided, but it is not even clear who will run the railway.
The article makes it sound like this is atypical. This is standard practice for any major new service, where the operator typically is awarded the contract 18-12 months before operations begin who, with the regulator, determines the tariffs. Nothing out of the ordinary here. Maybe the author is thinking this is an extension of an existing service where both the operator & tariffs would already be known. If anything, the author should have instead gone after HOW the contract was awarded.
Quote:Kenyan officials have apparently taken to skipping trade conferences of late to avoid answering questions.
I can’t speak to officials attendance at trade conferences, but someone please show me a single project in Kenya where the government openly releases detailed information about a project of this scale. I’m not trying to defend officials stance on the dearth of public information (which will hopefully change sometime soon), but writing it to sound like officials have suddenly “taken to skipping conferences of late” tells me that the author has never been here long enough (or ever?) to know what the order of the day is.
Quote:Its fastest trains will do a fairly mediocre 80kph
The trains announced will reportedly do 120kph (max 158kph), so I don’t know where they’re getting their data from.
Quote:parts of the new line will be single-track, forcing trains to stop, often for hours, to let others pass
Yes, it’s single track causing delays, but unless the author has seen a published train schedule, there’s no way they can claim trains will often stop for hours to let others pass. But with 23 passing stations, a computerized scheduling system & a competent operator, I’m pretty confident the delays will be minimal (& quite easily non-existent to passenger trains if need be).
Quote:Most absurdly, it is built to a lower standard of load-bearing than most other new freight railways. Some fret it may not be possible to load four full containers onto each wagon, as is done on other new lines. “They’re getting a third-rate railway for the cost of a very expensive one,” says a consultant.
Does anyone more familiar with the announced trains know if this is true what the article is claiming? Oh, & you gotta love the unnamed source of such a headliner quote http://www.skyscrapercity.com/images/smilies/shake.gif
I’m not saying Kenya’s SGR is without risk or its faults, but the article is trying to make a story about the complete ineffectiveness of the project that just isn’t there.
Oh & that last sentence is just plain offensive:
Quote:On a continent where almost everything is reused, from mobile-phone parts to plastic bags, governments seem to prefer to buy shiny new things, however expensive.
Economist, please, it’s 2016… we expect better journalism from you by now.
