The Follo Railroad without management and control
The opening of Follo Railroad is both delayed by one year and will be NOK 2 billion more expensive than budgeted for. This was made known on Friday. The Norwegian Labour Party Leader, Jonas Gahr Støre, is very critical.
“The Follo Railroad is an illustration of splitting up and pulverisation of responsibility in the poorly managed railway sector,” Støre thunders to Aftenposten.
He believes that the project totally lacks both management and control.
“For 20 years I have worked closely with persons who are dependent on these trains. That has made an impression. The commuters are the first we think of now that the news is that everyone who is dependent on this project must wait,” Støre continues.
He believes that the railway sector should have had a more unified leadership – and believes that the fragmentation that the bourgeois Government has been at the forefront of – has made it more difficult to manage the project.
Mayors want buses
Less than two weeks ago, on January 9th, Minister of Transport, Jon Georg Dale (FrP), informed that everything was on track.
Now he says to the newspaper that there is no doubt that he should have been provided with the information he now possesses, earlier.
“Primarily it is Bane Nor who ought to have this control. But two days before I was at the Parliament, I had checked and received information from Bane Nor, who ensured that the schedule was kept,” Dale explains.
Dale has entrusted the Norwegian Railway Directorate with the task of looking at options for what can be done for the commuters on the Østfold line. The local mayors call for more buses.
The Fornebu link is delayed as well
The Follo Railroad project is part of the Intercity development – and will provide eleven minutes of travel time between Oslo and Ski when it is completed, which is a halving of the current travel time. 72 per cent of the development is completed.
On Friday it was also made known that the Fornebu link will be delayed as well. That was planned to be completed by the autumn of 2025. It must be expected up to one and a half years of extra construction time in the project, according to a recent report which NRK has access to.
