Rail vandalism Re: [Peakoil] Significant interview

[Alex P]

This is pretty shocking:

"So in the early 1990's, one of the things that the then Queensland 
government did was it looked at country rail lines and said, Are these rail 
lines efficient? Are they profitable insofar as the number of people 
completely covers the cost of operating this service? And where that didn't 
stack up we shut the rail lines. But it was a belligerent exercise. We 
didn't merely stop operating the trains, we tore up the tracks and sold the 
corridors. So I think of it as a belligerent economic rationalism where we 
said 'Not only are we not going to do this but we're going to make it 
really hard to ever go back.' And so we burned our bridges, literally. 
That's, I think, going to be looked on as one of the major policy failings 
of the last quarter of a century in Queensland because the idea that rail 
had to be profitable for government to offer it, a rail service had to be 
profitable, is missing the point about building public infrastructure and 
public capacity, and indeed service to the public."

Fortunately the NSW rail authorities have a policy of not selling off rail 
corridors, even if the rail line is booked out of use.

Alex
O4O4873828

ACT Peak Oil discussion list
http://act-peakoil.org

On Wed, 31 Aug 2005 09:32:15 +1000 (EST), "POLLARD,Sandy" 
<Sandy.POLLARD at dewr.gov.au> wrote :

> This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
> 
> 
> Dear all
>  
> Further to our discussion last Wednesday re Andrew McNamara, a very
> significant interview with him by Global Public Media:
>  
> http://www.energybulletin.net/8501.html
>  
> IMO, this is the most important public statement so far in this country
> on Peak Oil by a senior person with the ear of other politicians and
> government (albeit at the state level). Matches what Roscoe Bartlett is
> doing in the US.
>  
> Note the fact the he is working on a major report to the Queensland
> cabinet, due in October.
>  
> Regards  
>  
> Sandy Pollard
>  
> --
> 
> Notice:
> The information contained in this e-mail message and any attached files 
may
> be confidential information, and may also be the subject of legal
> professional privilege.  If you are not the intended recipient any use,
> disclosure or copying of this e-mail is unauthorised.  If you have 
received
> this e-mail in error, please notify the sender immediately by reply e-mail
> and delete all copies of this transmission together with any attachments.
> 
> 
> 
>