EDITORIAL - No more derailment

Commuters reportedly erupted in applause as the train service resumed at daybreak last Monday between Lucena, Quezon and Calamba, Laguna.

The service had been suspended for a month as the Philippine National Railways conducted repairs on the rails, embankment and bridges. Regular riders said they preferred the train to the bus because rail services are faster and more affordable.

Commuter and light railway services are also popular in Metro Manila, and their development should have been given priority a long time ago. Using trains for transporting cargo can also improve logistics and ease traffic congestion in Metro Manila.

Yet the revival of train services in Luzon has not moved fast enough, and has even been derailed by scandals.

For example, a decade after their purchase, three of the 48 trains imported by the government from China were finally put to use only this week.

The first of the trains purchased from Dalian Locomotives rolled out along the Metro Rail Transit Line 3 yesterday, with President Marcos gracing the event. Along with the train deployment, the government announced a 50-percent discount on MRT and Light Rail Transit lines for senior citizens and persons with disabilities, who were the first to board the trains.

Three Dalian trains with a total of nine cars are now in service. Why did it take years from their delivery from 2015 to 2016 to deploy the trains? Because with a weight of 49.7 tons, each train was found to be too heavy for the rails and incompatible with the MRT 3 system.

The project also became bogged down in litigation, with the Commission on Audit reporting in 2017 that the train supplier, CRRC Dalian Co. Ltd., owed the Department of Transportation P1.3 billion in liquidated damages.

Based on a COA report, the DOTr also scrapped in November 2017 its contract with the maintenance service provider, Busan Universal Rail Inc. The DOTr filed graft complaints against BURI and former transport secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya.

With no new trains and maintenance services stuck in litigation, light railway services deteriorated. Time and the elements surely also degraded the Dalian trains as they sat unused.

Today, the country’s first subway project, under construction in Metro Manila and much awaited by the public, is also mired in controversy.

At least the commuter train and light railway operations are picking up speed. The government must see to it that the momentum of railway development will be sustained.