City Should Come Clean On LRT Repair Scandal
When did Alstom stop working on this LRT repair redesign? Was it last week? Last year? And why are we only hearing of this now?
If they have a “sustainable solution”, what is it? Are we just going to be told that they have the answer but not what it is, how or when it will be implemented, what it will cost and who’s paying for it? More importantly, are we going to hear what makes them think this solution will work when no other one has had success?
They seem to think it’s enough to toss off their statement that they’ve solved the problem and all will be as it should. Don’t they get that the public has been burned too many times to accept their invitation to come to the fire and warm our hands? They need to provide a clear explanation of this miracle solution AND provide solid proof that it will work. I don’t want to hear any sentences that start with words like “We believe …” or “It’s our expectation that …”.
We’re long past the “take it on faith” stage and have learned through this long fiasco that nothing Alstom, RTG, city bureaucrats or Ottawa City Council say can be accepted as true unless we see incontrovertible evidence that proves they aren’t lying, fudging the truth or withholding essential information. We also need to have all the information about any proposed solution, not just carefully chosen segments that leave out anything that doesn’t fit the narrative they’re selling.
It would be nice to think that councillors would ask the hard questions about this or any other LRT-related matter but we all know how unlikely that is. It would be even nicer to think that city staff, Rideau Transit Group and Alstom would answer any question they were asked truthfully and fulsomely with no lying. Also unlikely to happen. After all, we’re just the suckers who are paying through the nose for a transit system that doesn’t work. What right do we have to know what’s going on?
The Voter is a respected community activist and long-time Bulldog commenter who prefers to keep her identity private.
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– The Bulldog – News Feed Enter 
It is being reported that OC Transpo GM Renee Amilcar says that RTG and Alstom have not put their commercial interests to the side, which is impeding the solution.
RTG is pointing at Alstom to fix the wheel hub assembly, while Alstom is pointing to the multiple tight curves along the track. From the business perspective, neither side wishes to face the potential financial consequences of their collective failures.
Transit Chair Gower has clearly taken RTG’s side in this dispute. Why? Is it because the route design involving the multiple tight curves was a city decision? The consequence of which is that the city will bear some of the costs of reworking the track layout?
Circling back to The Voter’s concerns. It is long past time that council steps up to the microphone and provides a fulsome, honest dissertation on the operational and financial consequences of this ongoing dilemma. Uncomfortable as that might be, it something that a leader would do. But leadership is not a strong suit, dare I say a void, at city hall.
We will never find out any revealing information about this disaster, because council members are cowards and afraid to have the blame dropped on them because of their poor decisions. Unless the provincial government steps in and actually publicizes the actual contract, nothing will happen. the mayor and council can’t afford to have us know who really decided on the contract.