Columnist Jeff German: Monorail’s track record grows worse

Friday, Feb. 4, 2005 | 11:08 a.m.

Todd Walker may have the toughest job in town these days.

Walker is the spokesman for the Las Vegas Monorail -- the $650 million privately run transit system that received millions of dollars in tax breaks and keeps breaking down.

It's the system that's known more for raining parts onto the gridlocked streets of the Strip corridor than for relieving traffic congestion.

Walker woke up Wednesday morning to another public relations nightmare -- a new glitch in the monorail's operation and, yes, more falling parts.

Prior to the system's 7 a.m. opening, engineers discovered a malfunction along a small stretch of the 3.9 mile track. A couple of lightweight metal strips protecting the power rail had broken off and fallen 20 feet to the parking lot of the Las Vegas Hilton.

The decision was made to keep the monorail shut down until the problem could be investigated and fixed.

By 7:30 a.m., after county engineers were summoned to the scene and after the media saw that the trains weren't running, Walker began getting barraged with calls from reporters.

His initial response was that this was just a minor glitch, and the trains would be up and running by 9 a.m.

The spin Walker put out was that this kind of thing could happen in any electrical train system in the world -- not just the monorail in Las Vegas.

He might be right. But the difference here is that the Las Vegas Monorail has had a poor track record from the very beginning. It opened six months behind schedule in July and has a history of similar closures in the last five months.

We have a right to be skeptical of the monorail's ability to provide us with safe and reliable service.

The system was shut down Sept. 1 for six days after a 60-pound wheel assembly fell to the ground. No sooner had service resumed when a series of large metal washers fell from a train, prompting a 14-week overhaul and shutdown until Christmas Eve.

Parts even broke away during the testing phase of the monorail, which undoubtedly contributed to the delay of the July grand opening.

On Wednesday the trains had only been back on line for a little more than a month when the power rail strips fell off and forced the latest closure.

As 9 a.m. passed and there were still no trains in sight, Walker said the opening was pushed back until later in the morning. When the morning ended without the resumption of service, we were told the trains would be up and running after lunch, then later in the afternoon and finally by the evening.

Eventually service started up at 7:40 p.m., about 12 hours after Walker began navigating through the crisis.

The next morning, about 50-60 media calls later, Walker really turned on the spin.

Walker said a "hot spot" occurred as a result of wear and tear, probably from all of those additional months of testing last year.

Monorail engineers, he said, would be watching that section of the track much closer from now on.

That was comforting, but overall not very reassuring.

Walker had trouble explaining why the "hot spot" wasn't found sooner, why the metal strips fell to the ground and just what happens when a train runs through a damaged area of the power rail.

Those answers presumably are forthcoming in a report to the county.

But worse, Walker couldn't guarantee that this would be the last of the hot spots discovered along the lengthy transportation route.

Engineers, he said, already have identified another part of the track that could be prone to wear and tear.

Monorail officials had better hope the next "hot spot" doesn't occur while a train is carrying a load of passengers.

That could turn into more than just a public relations nightmare.

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