I travel on a train five days a week and normally delays are my main concern. Fortunately the quality of the train experience when it actually arrives is now pretty good, after years of travelling on prehistoric trains we actually now have new trains on our line mow, that even have an intercom so they can tell you why they are running late. They even give an airline type safety announcement at the start of each journey, but by that stage I usually have my headphones on an miss it.
However, I have been on a train that derailed, so although safety isn't usually a criteria that people choose their transport options by, it clearly can become one if incidents become a regular pattern. So this week there was a derailment near Wellington central station and fortunately no one was seriously hurt. However in the media commentary since, we have learnt that on those trains maintenance has been deferred that should have been dome five years ago. Looks at this stage that the train derailed because something fell off it underneath and ended up being propelled through the floor of the train. Luckily no one was standing where it came through the floor and the train was travelling slow at the time.
When you buy your train ticket, you assume that getting you there safely is part of the service, and in this case that Trans Metro don't allow important maintenance to go five years past when it should have been scheduled. I still went on the train home that night, we have newer trains on out line anyway. But they may well lose passengers and if something else happens now they may lose a lot more. But they probably still wont lose as many as if the trains never arrive on time. A train has to become very unsafe before the passenger factors it in as a reason not to travel.
