by Freddy Ponce Badilla [1]
After nearly a year of implementing the Plan for Modernization of Transportation Santiago there are several sequels and victims of the 11 months of operation of Transantiago. For the moment, users of a system that clearly was not ready to start its operation.
In government should leave office, a Minister of the Interior, a Ministry of Transport, a Transantiago Coordinator and the Manager of the Consortium of Banks and Financial Institutions as part of the AFT. Also, since the currency has already been announced in the coming days will be renewed sector teams have been involved in every stage of Transantiago. Also, you can not fail to mention that the problems of public transportation in Santiago have triggered a political crisis never before seen in the 17-year rule of the Coalition.
However, one of the largest homeless, and about which very little has been said, is the Civil Engineering degree in Transportation. In fact, the implementation of Transantiago meant to Engineering Transport as has hitherto been taught at the universities of our country, mainly at the Universities of Chile, Catholic and Concepción.
Before going into details and arguments, and as a reference to those unfamiliar with this professional and academic, some background that can illustrate better the understanding of this article:
• In its infancy, civil engineering, transport derived from civil engineering works as a specialization in construction related to transport infrastructure. Indeed, this branch of knowledge arises from the need for civil engineering professionals to specialize in the design, planning and execution of works whose special features made them different from other civil works construction. Thus was born the specialization in transport for those civilian engineers and professional whose specialty is the construction of airports, ports, roads and railways.
· Rear, advances in knowledge and needs a greater degree of understanding of the phenomena, but most of the externalities caused by transport, possible that the resulting engineering expertise for research, development and teaching of specific topics such such as transport economics, the theory of traffic flow, transport demand and transport networks, leaving a junior level teaching materials, and construction management issues.
· In the late seventies and early eighties, leading academics and researchers from the traditional universities of our country went abroad (England and USA [2], in most cases) to improve knowledge of transport. Thus, in light of the review of developments that have experienced the curricula of civil engineering transportation provided by traditional universities of our country, the result is clear and obvious: transport teaching definitely led to theoretical and conceptual aspects of civil engineering, transport, focusing on education and discussion of simulation models, apart from matters related to the case study, the traffic engineering and management of transport companies.
· Without any doubt, the universities and academic training led this bet, got what you deserve. Proof of this is that:
o Most teachers who teach in the classrooms of our country's leading universities have master's degrees and doctorates.
or are part of the international circuit of conferences and seminars of transport, as the organizers, exhibitors and / or referees.
or international media frequently publish specialized reference, in most cases, issues arising from the discussion of transport models.
or are frequently cited by researchers in other countries, articles and periodicals in transportation research related discussion of transport models.
or were able to create / adapt special simulation models for the mobility conditions of our country.
Notwithstanding all these "achievements", there can be no Transantiago doubt meant not only the death of Civil Engineering degree in Transportation, but also the need to reinvent the academic models on which to base the training of new professionals in the future will dare to explore this question race engineering.
First, and to support this claim, it is worth mentioning that the need for a quality public transport is a requirement that must be permanently manned by the government, which is enshrined in the Constitution and should not, or may be the poor relation of public policy. Indeed, there is no place in the world where policies, plans and environmental programs, energy, health and road safety can not be sustained on a public transport system that is not only attractive, but efficient, effective and good quality for its users.
While at this point, there are reasonable doubts about the need in the Government to reform the old system of transportation in the capital, is worth remembering that it was a service that was poorly rated by users, which was responsible an important part of air pollution and brought a lot of people died in traffic accidents in which they saw involved.
The obvious need for reforms transport system was met with which, at that moment, were recognized as top specialists. Those who constantly write in journals, participating in conferences and seminars and were the authors of the simulation models dealing permanently for evaluating investments in transportation infrastructure upgrades such as Metro and urban concessions. It was they who convinced the authorities of the need to re-organize the existing routes mesh until then and that was the fruit of 50 years of adjustment and operation. The reasons given were technical and economic irrationality of the mesh of routes.
However, the strength of their the technical arguments [3], the fact is that these same explanations could not be displayed with the same forcefulness minute walk Transantiago casting. One reason for this situation was the rigid conceptual and intellectual arrogance that was met solving a complex problem, which resulted in the mesh of route transit, without scales, from an irrational to another.
Using an analogy of the air transport market, the old mesh of routes [4] would be the equivalent of having available a flight from Santiago to anywhere in the world, at any time, without a stopover anywhere . While this may be a nice dream everyone knows that the flights are scheduled according to the demands of passages that are the origins and destinations. Indeed, though the wicked are a paradise islands that anyone would know, the truth is that anyone who wants to travel to that destination, knows that at least should make a stopover in Europe or Oceania. Any other situation would be unsustainable from the standpoint of technical and economic.
Following the same analogy, the new mesh of paths represents the other extreme of what would be unwilling to do or to tolerate a trip on a commercial airline. This mesh of paths [5] that we might, for example, travel to Buenos Aires, not only by scale but by changing planes in Mendoza and Cordoba then.
Despite evidence of failure, defended the simulation model to absurdity, causing immeasurable inconvenience to users, a serious political crisis and a loss of credibility in the technical support which has been based coalition to govern these 17.
Regarding this last point, Transantiago broke a balance that has allowed the ruling coalition is the most successful in the history of Chile: politics and technocracy. Indeed, the equation that combines the one hand, respect of technical the difficult art of governing a country and, secondly, the political confidence of the technical solutions to structural problems arising in our society, was severely affected by poor design and implementation of public policy. Transportation engineers must take responsibility that they bear in the alteration of this formula no longer enjoys the confidence of the main actors of society.
Cortázar Minister's efforts have meant, among other things, add new routes to the grid without the need to wait years the results of the simulation model, but with common sense and the demands of users public transport. The result is that the valuation of the New Transantiago is rising among whom use the system [6].
The challenge is great. Not only is re-inventing a professional area that has been seriously affected, it is also necessary to see how to put back the trust between the political and technical. On this occasion, transportation engineers have the floor again.
[1] Civil Engineering in Transportation, University of Chile and Master of Transport of the same university. -----
[2] It is noteworthy that, unlike what happened in those moments in our country the distribution of different types of travel (modal split) widely favored private transportation on the public. In fact, government efforts, scholars and technicians in these countries were focused mainly on transferring trips from cars to mass transit systems. By contrast, in our country travel on buses accounted for 70% of motorized trips in the city of Santiago.
[3] demonstrated through the results of simulation models, economic indicators and complex theoretical concepts.
[4] Under the old system for less than 10% of users to make transfers in their travels.
[5] The mesh of paths that users faced on February 10, 2007 contemplated transfers by over 60% of trips.
[6] The assessment of Transantiago is greater among those using the system than among those who do not use. The influence of the media is vital for this condition occurs.
0 comments:
Post a Comment