Unfortunately rail commuters on the Southern Line in particular are in for a slow trip home tonight as a result of a women being fatally hit by a train in Takanini. Here are a couple of updates from Transdev.
Rail replacement buses have been arranged for Homai, Manurewa, Te Mahia, Takanini and Papakura Stations on Auckland’s Southern Line. Train services are currently suspended between Homai and Papakura due to a person fatally struck by a train.
Due to the time of day buses may not arrive in some locations until 4pm so rail passengers are encouraged to phone AT on (09) 3666400 to find out about alternative transport options which may be quicker.
Maps to rail bus stops can be found at station entrances.
Delays and cancellations will be in place for Southern and Eastern Line services this afternoon and we sincerely apologise to our customers for the inconvenience caused.
We will update on the resumption of train services as soon as possible.
Transdev staff and customers who witnessed the incident will be offered counselling.
and
Train services are not expected to resume between Homai and Papakura stations until around 6pm after a person was fatally struck by a train. Police are completing site investigations at Takanini.
Rail replacement bus services are in place at Homai, Manurewa, Te Mahia, Takanini and Papakura stations. In addition, Howick & Eastern buses are accepting train tickets on their services between Homai and Papakura.
Delays and cancellations will continue to affect Eastern and Southern Line train services well into the evening. People wishing to travel by train are encouraged to use the journey planner at www.AT.co.nz or call (09) 3666400 to find out about alternative travel options which may be quicker.
We apologise for the inconvenience and thank rail customers for bearing with us during this disruption to train services.
We obviously don’t know the exact details and it isn’t wise to speculate either however one thing we can be sure of is that this is going to be incredibly upsetting to:
- the women’s family who have lost a loved one
- the driver of the train
- the passengers on the train
- anyone else in the area who may have witnessed the incident
With our new electric trains – which really are both quicker and quieter – already being tested and the first services only ~6 months away it’s timely to remind people to be careful around the rail network.
I’m also aware that over recent months Auckland Transport have once again been reviewing the situation around level crossings. Hopefully this will finally lead to some action as to the removal of level crossings, especially from within the urban area. It’s not something that can happen straight away but is something that we should progressively be working towards, perhaps by doing one or two per year. Of course it won’t stop every incident but should hopefully help reduce the number of them.
This incident also follows a number of accidents on the motorway network on Friday which ground the road network across much of the region to a halt.
Processing...
Very sad for everyone involved. Auckland really needs to start getting rid of most of its level crossings. Compared to other cities in the world (London comes to mind), where level crossings are extremely rare and access to platforms is almost solely by bridges and subways, Auckland really is very far behind. I really hope that the situation is improved so that tragic incidents like this can be prevented in the future.
Harry – London has lots of level crossings, particularly in the north east and the south west. A reason that the Airtrack scheme for access to Heathrow from the south west failed was local opposition to more trains across the many level crossings in the area.
But in terms of pedestrian level crossings and having to cross the track to access the platforms, Auckland is an extremely long way behind other cities like London. In London there are bridges or subways to the platforms at 95% of the stations, but in Auckland that number is significantly lower, I’d estimate around 60%. Also, in London the default seems to be bridges and tunnels with level crossing being used only when the other two aren’t practical. In Auckland the default is level crossings, with grade separation only occurring on very busy roads, or on the rare occasion that enough money has been allocated to allow for grade separation.
Unfortunately, if people want to do this kind of thing on purpose, there’s very little that can be done to stop it. Sydney has virtually no level crossings in the urban area (none that I know of) but fatalities happen from time to time. My train the other night was cancelled the other night because of it. In fact, it must happen so often that there was virtually no mention of it in the news. I find it hard to believe that (in normal circumstances) someone could not hear a loud diesel train from quite some distance. Obviously, it’s a horrific thing no matter how you look at it.
Yep incidents are a fact of life on a rail network, as are car crashes on a road network but I guess the key is to try and minimise them as much as possible. In the recent years most of the incidents we’ve had have tended to be in areas where there is much easier access to the rail network like around level crossings
Totally in favour of pedestrian walkway removal. Have lost count of the number of people who take a chance walking in front of our trains.
L.E. – many more people take a chance walking in front of road vehicles: are you going to stop people crossing roads, too? Pedestrian level crossings provide important links that would otherwise be severed by railway lines: closing them would put people on the roads, where they are at much greater risk.
Agree. Motorways and multi-lane busy roads have this same severing effect too. The distance required to travel to a crossing point is not a big inconvenience in a car, but is significant when walking/cycling etc.
I have just returned from Perth and noticed that they have gates on their pedestrian crossings (of which I saw quite a few) which lock shut when the bells start ringing. Seemed to be very effective and probably cost effective.
Their trains travel at upto 135kph and are quiet.
Are there any issues with pedestrians being stuck on the tracks when the gates close?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BiqivySF0jM Sliverstream Station in Wellington has those gates, it has an emergency exit route off to the side in case you are stuck between the gates.
I just noticed….You can see a cross on the light pole.
Evidence that nothing every seems to be done to improve safety until an incident occurs. We really need to start taking a proactive approach to rail safety if we want to reduce the number of deaths.
We have the lockable gates on a few places out west but they only seem to get used in locations where is is a pedestrian only crossing, not somewhere where there’s a road crossing too. I guess the thinking is that if there’s a road crossing then people could just ignore the pedestrian one too. The issue with them though is they have an escape gate next to them (should they start closing while you’re crossing) but many people just open that and walk through anyway. Have even seen kids using it to play chicken with trains.
iPod generation? Regardless, there are significant cost and geometric issues impacting most of the level crossings. I think it will be a decade or two before they are all grade separated or closed.
The Taka St pedestrian crossings don’t appear to be gated, although many are, eg Kingdon St (I think). But they have a maze forcing you to face both ways. Of course, that presupposes using the maze rather than the road. Even with grade separation a pedestrian may choose to take a shortcut unless totally prevented by fencing.
On the noise aspect, yes those EMUs are virtually silent. I went to Newmarket Station last Monday week (11th) at around 1am to see it up close. The only noise was from the brakes.
Was on train. I saw the body covered with the sheet. Very small. Apparently a 12 year old girl according to police.govt.nz
Life is cheap in the low income suburbs. Not enough money to grade separate until a few more kids die and there is a bigger uproar. But plenty of money for RONs to the PM’s holiday home and East-West motorways through poor areas.
Have edited as information in it is unconfirmed. – Matt
Edited as per above – Matt
Ah no – yuck. No amount of grade separation will stop that. Thoughts to the family who just lost a loved one, and to the driver, train manager and passengers on that train (the 2:25pm via Newmarket).
In my short time at Transdev that was the one thing I dreaded when Train Control rang…
Judging from this comment I can guess what the speculation is, and we really shouldn’t be talking about that sort of tragedy unless it is confirmed.
I took the comment in context from what was said above and gathered from the police site. None the less AT and Transdev do not use with word “Fatality” loosely and when the word is used it is done after checks and balances have been done prior.
The edited comments made it seem like suicide, which hasn’t been confirmed, sorry if that is not what was meant, just think that speculation along those lines is very poor taste.
http://www.police.govt.nz/news/updates/31378
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/9443365/Police-Girls-death-treated-as-suicide
Police treating it as a suicide and are conducting an investigation into it. Also waiting on coroners report as well.
Tragic and my thoughts and prayers again to the family, the driver, train manager, passengers and witnesses – especially so close to Christmas
Where exactly did the incident occur?
It is sad for the lady’s/girl’s family, but is it really necessary to close off the line for hours on end. In Japan when someone jumps on the line to commit suicide they re-open the line fairly quickly. When things like this happen it will cause chaos without buses as a alternative, since they mostly feed into the rail.
You prick! In New Zealand the life of people is important. Evidence needs to be collected immediately.