BOSTON — Keolis, the international company that won a tough competition to run commuter trains out of Boston, may have second thoughts about its contract with the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority. According to a report by State House News Service, Keolis lost $29.3 million over the first year of its long-term contract, requiring its French parent company to subsidize its Massachusetts operations.
According to Massachusetts Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack, Keolis Commuter Services likely failed to fully account for the cost of providing service to the region.
Keolis won the contract in January 2014 over Massachusetts Bay Commuter Railroad. The bid would pay Keolis $2.69 billion for the first eight years with an option to extend an additional four years for a total cost not to exceed $4.26 billion.
A Keolis representative said in a statement that fixing MBTA’s issues had taken longer and proved more costly than the railroad operator expected and that Keolis is looking for ways operate “more efficiently.”
Years ago management teams came in and tried to fix the T and the state politicians blocked any moves to change any of the existing multiple union rules. A life long child hood friend worked for the T in the maintanace department. He was allowed to change one set of brakes per 8 hours. He said it took less than two hours to do it. The politicians blocked any outsourcing. Many employees do their own time sheets and recently they found close to two thirds made over $100,000 last year.
Correctomundo, McGuire. MBTA should pay all employees a Bernie Sanders "Living Wage" of $15.00/hour, including contractors. They'd be 'in-the-black' in a heartbeat and fares could be lowered. Flip a burger, or flip a seatback? Same skill set!
Someone at MBTA did something right! C'est la vie, Keolis.
Mr. McGuire,
No doubt the MBTA has its fault, some of them considerable. But they also run on some of the oldest railroad in the country, much of it in need of or in the midst of rebuilding (Haverhill line, Fitchburg, & two ancient draws on the Nypt/Rockport line. Keolis maintains AND operates the trains, the track & signals, and dispatches the entire railroad (EXCEPT South Station and the Providence/NEC line) Signal failures on the Amtrak's NEC are more difficult to fix because of the two additional system overlays: ACSES (PTC) and cab signaling, plus the CTC the rest of the system uses. ACSES was designed and built to Amtrak specs, and will soon be installed and in use on all of the MBTA, Metro-North MTA, NJ Transit, Septa, MARC, and VRE. Amtrak developed this system a full 15 years before any Federal Mandate, and we now have a proven system to install thanks to their foresight.
No commuter agency, large, small, public or private would have been able to foresee the huge problem this previous winter posed. Keolis extrapolated numbers from previous operations outside of MA, but this has proved only partially successful in MBTA territory with it's sprawling, aging infrastructure and weather issues. Time will tell if they renew after 8 years.
My comment referring to ISIS may have been out of line but the rest of my comment stands. People from California, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois and elsewhere who wear "rose colored glasses' when it comes to government railroad passenger operations and don't have to deal with the MBTA and don't see the details about their inefficiencies and stupidity need to do some more homework and find out for themselves. Keolis only operates the trains it is the MBTA who provides the equipment and directs the operation. The signal problems that forced huge delays in commuter service this week were not Keolis' fault but Amtrak's. Most everything else is the MBTA. Mr. Parker from Massachusetts knows what I'm talking about. Most users of the "T" would also agree with me.
How much of this is due to the 'winter from hell' with all the cancelled trains and unscheduled expenses from snow removal? Plus how is Amtrak responsible, as they only did MBCR dispatch, operations, and maintenance? What about BBD/alternate concepts, since their bid was far below Amttrak, did they defer maintenance?
Hey, thanks for the FOX News version of whats wrong.
Dealing with government at any level is "the kiss of death". Dealing with the MBTA is worse than dealing with ISIS I imagine. Keolis has quite successfully run commuter service in other cities. The MBTA is an enormously overstaffed, incredibly undermanaged albatross that has reached out of control proportions due to inept managment and huge pro-union, anti commuter and anti taxpayer legislative interference. It can't run the commuter lines it has yet it continues to try and expand. It should be looking at discontinuing some of its lines and running more trains on those that are left. Construction costs are ridiculous. Although it doesn't involve Keolis, the green line expansion project is so over budget and behind schedule that they don't even know what the final cost is going to be. Only the government can screw things up this badly. Amtrak screwed it up terribly and now anyone who is foolish enough to try and pick up the pieces is going to regret it. Keolis should look for a loophole in order to get out of this mess.
Privatization is Pure Evil.
Sounds like Keolis isn't doing any better at running MBTA commuter than Amtrak did. So much for the "private business can do much better than public agency" myth.
AKA "The Price of Low Price"
Anytime somebody compares a public transit organization or any other public organization in this country to ISIS that person looses all credibility. If the private company that is running this railroad looses money it does not necessarily mean that they are a wronged party.
From where I sit, I think Robert McGuire has it about right.
If anyone thinks that running a commuter train service can be made profitable, without getting assistance, really does not understand the dynamics at play. The reality is that with all passenger services be it plane, bus, train, or ship, there is always a point to where the fare box will not cover all operating, capital, maintenance, and personnel costs. As one other person has said the bid may not have been fully budgeted to account for certain items. The winter that paralyzed that area brought in an unforeseen amount of expense across the board. Hopefully this will help other companies looking to get into passenger travel to fully examine all current and potential costs of operating.