NSW rail gets centralised tech control

The dramatic split of NSW’s RailCorp into two organisations dealing with intra-state and metropolitan rail will see the construction of a purpose-built infrastructure operations centre.

Acccording to NSW Government documentation, the new centre will be a single point of control for electrical, rail technology, control systems, passenger information and infrastructure operations.

At present, these functions are split between six control centres, with the result rail outages and system failures are often addressed with an uncoordinated response.

The NSW Government also indicated it has integrated rail transport schedules with Google Maps, and has developed an app for iOS and Android smart phones.

The Government also pledged to create a sleeker communications infrastructure in a bid to have clearer communications with rail commuters about outages and equipment failures affecting journeys.

RailCorp is being divided into Sydney Trains and NSW Trains, with the changes to come into effect in July 2013.

As a result of the changes, 240 jobs will go, on top of the 750 middle management redundancies already taken place.

Maintenance positions are also set to go, with 450 people out of a total maintenance staff of 4700 being shown the door.

The NSW Government was unable to comment on the likely impact of the changes on the organisation’s IT infrastructure at the time of publication.