Saftey Issues

This morning we have the most deadpan train guard I have ever encountered.
Even allowing for the metallic sound of the PA system this guy has no inflective in his voice at all. His announcements are all delivered in the monotone of a computer-generated voice. In fact, I’m a bit worried that he may be a prospective kidnapper practising his ‘phone voice’ for when he talks to the victim’s parents.
Then there is the accent. Actually accent is being kind because he isn’t speaking English. From what I can tell he is Asian and he is speaking to us in his own tongue, in monotone.
Interesting career advice from someone, cant speak the lingo, hmmm let’s see, I know how about a customer focused position in state rail. That’s gold!
Now, we are all laughing at the announcements. We cannot understand one word this guy is saying. He is calling the names of the stations; if I couldn’t see the sign on the platform I wouldn’t know where I was. And as for the “doors closing, stand clear” announcement; I’m not sure he is even calling it.
Who recruited this bloke? Who trained him? Didn’t anyone notice that he couldn’t speak English?
Some of the passengers are really laughing now, our travel guide is giving us some sort of message but it is impossible to understand what he is saying.
The train I’m on is one of the really old ones, which, according to recent information released to the media makes up about 50% of our rail transport system. We are sitting in a carriage with no air conditioning, the temperature is about 28 degrees, humidity is running at close enough to 85% and it is sunny. The train pulls out of a station and stops, right out in the sun in the middle of nowhere. We sit waiting for the damn thing to get going again but it just sits there. The temperature inside is getting really uncomfortable, all of us are sweating profusely and those of us with water are guzzling it down (subsequently sweating more). All the windows are open but we aren’t getting any air, a couple of people open the doors in between carriages but without the train moving we are just sitting there in stale hot air. A couple of men passengers pry open the electronic doors to get some more air in, we can hear the guard presumably telling them to shut the doors but as no one can understand him they ignore the voice and keep the doors open to try to let in some air.
I have perspiration running in rivulets down my back, it is stiflingly hot and the whole charade has stopped being funny.
We are getting regular updates from our guard but we don’t know what he is saying to us. I’m concentrating really hard but I just can’t understand. Most of us are getting cranky and impatient now. The heat makes you mad and the idiocy of employing this particular guard is just a red rag to a really cranky herd of bulls.
We have been sitting out in the hot sun for about 20 minutes when suddenly a voice comes over the PA system. ‘Would the passengers holding the automatic doors open in carriages 2,3,5,6 & 8 please let the doors close so that I can start moving this train’.
Ah, an intelligible voice. The driver, no less. One of the passengers who was holding the door in our carriage pressed the intercom button and told the driver that he wouldn’t let the door go until the train moved as we were all suffocating and needed the air. The driver replied that the guard had been trying to tell us all to shut the doors for about 10 minutes and whoever was holding the doors would be fined and the police would be called if they didn’t let the doors go. Of course they let go of the doors and about 30 seconds after they shut the train moved off and about 100 metres up the track pulled into the next station.
As the guard released the doors a mass of people churned out of the carriage and straight up to his door, yelling abuse, shaking fists etc. He shut his door and retreated inside his little hidey-hole. The Station Master was calling for calm over the PA on the station as it did look like people were going to lynch him.
Eventually everyone calmed down of course but really, who can blame them. I was stewing in my own juices for the whole time we were stationary and I can honestly say that if that little jerk called out one more time in that unintelligible garble I would have punched him.
What on earth is happening at Cityrail? How can you possibly have someone who cannot communicate operating a public address system in a job that entails so much responsibility?
There are a few people at fault here as I see it.
Firstly the guard himself, he must be living in some kind of fantasy world if he thinks that he is doing a wonderful job. He must know he is a nightmare to listen to; he can’t do his job properly if he is unable to communicate something as simple as the name of a Station. He really should go and learn to speak English clearly, that is his responsibility.
Second, his supervisor, workmates and managers. Are they so frightened of being called racist that they are willing to put people’s lives at risk? I think it is totally unacceptable that the driver of the train has to override the guard over the PA system because there is a major language barrier. What if there was an emergency? We are continually being told about all the bad things that are happening to rail passengers because of train derailments, metal covers coming off the top of carriages, bush fires, signal and track failures on stinking hot days, rocks being thrown at the windows of passing trains, rocks being thrown on top of passing trains, the list goes on and on. What on earth would happen to the passengers on the train with this bloke? There could be a sick passenger, how would you communicate to him that we needed an ambulance? Worse, what if all that scare mongering that the Liberal Government did over the last 10 years came true….an explosive devise on the train?
Thirdly, of course, government. I’m sure the fat cats are sitting up there in Macquarie Street, nice and cool having driven to work in an airconditioned car, don’t give a rats about the discomfort or danger any of the plebs sitting in those sweat boxes are in.
We have watched the public transport system of NSW deteriorate steadily for the last 15 years or so, it was only a matter of time til the standard of staffing started to do the same. It’s such a tired, old system, top heavy with managers that trivialize the jobs underneath them that has crippled itself with political correctness and has a mindless striving for profit at the cost of customer service and comfort and safety.
Nice one!
Mind you the mindless voter hasn’t done anything to alleviate the problem either.