Metro announced today that two light rail lines, including the Purple Line, which runs primarily on Wheeler Street, will have a delayed 2015 opening. Problems with axle counters, which mark where trains are along the line, and a construction error in downtown near Minute Maid Park are to blame, according to the Houston Chronicle.
Two months ago, officials announced that both lines would be opening in December, just shy of their originally announced deadline. The rail line has been in construction since 2011.
Officials will present a revised schedule at Metro’s next board meeting on Sept. 25.
Are they even trying at this point? Way to screw over UH’s residentializing student body.
What the article FAILS to mention is that none of this is Metro’s fault. The defective axel-counters were manufactured and sent to Metro by another company named Siemens – it’s not their fault that they received a faulty product. The “construction” error was actually caused by the construction crew for the new Marriott Marquis hotel adjacent to the convention center. They broke a water line directly underneath the freshly-laid tracks. It’s not Metro’s fault that they had to excavate an entire section of track to fix the broken water line.
Watch the board meetings or read articles from other sources; Metro WANTS to open this line as soon as they can, but they can’t help the fact that external obstacles are being thrown in their way.
My thing is, when you’re the coordinating entity, even things that are out of your immediate control are still your fault. That’s the risk you take when you outsource a project and/or don’t build in enough float to accommodate the issues. You can’t advertise a date based off a hope that nothing goes wrong and expect to be absolved because your subcontractor was the one to blame for part of the delay.
If I paid Amazon for two day shipping and it didn’t arrive for four days, I wouldn’t take “UPS had a goof-up” as an excuse from Amazon. I’d still want a refund. I don’t see why Metro should be any different.
METRO is different in that, unlike Amazon, you didn’t hire them them to do something. You didn’t give them money in exchange for them building a rail line (at least not directly, I’m not sure if they received tax-payer backed subsidies.)
While it’s certainly frustrating that the rail line won’t be opening as we’d expected, METRO isn’t breaking a contract with us through the delay.
Since when was Wheeler St. the heart of campus?