Firm creating rail cars has staffing problems
CRAIG T. KOJIMA / MAY 2
Ansaldo Honolulu JV delivered the first train cars on time in March, but Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation officials have expressed concern in recent months that staffing vacancies at the company will hamper the progress of rail construction.
The Ansaldo Honolulu JV staffing problems that came to light last fall have persisted in recent months — and they’ve continued to worry those who oversee the island’s rail project, according to documents provided by the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation.
As recently as April, HART officials continued to raise red flags that “unacceptable” personnel vacancies within Ansaldo would hurt rail’s construction progress if they weren’t filled as soon as possible, letters obtained through a Honolulu Star-Advertiser public-records request show. The Hitachi-owned firm has a $1.4 billion contract to create and run rail’s train cars and its operating system.
“Recent and near term vacancies of (Ansaldo’s) current key personnel and other critical project personnel are again causing major concern,” HART Project Manager Justin Garrod wrote in an April 13 letter, echoing his earlier frustrations that go back to last summer.
The issue over Ansaldo vacancies — and HART’s concerns — first surfaced in October.
At that time Ansaldo’s project manager in Hawaii told the Star-Advertiser that the firm had already filled most of the positions in question months earlier, before HART raised the issue in July.
However, the recently obtained letters show that HART was still demanding that Ansaldo fill those key positions in September.
They included a communication lead engineer, a traction electrification lead engineer, an interface manager for construction and a project control manager.
“It has been almost two months since HART provided notice to (Ansaldo) on this matter. Today there is very little progress made,” Garrod wrote Ansaldo Project Manager Enrico Fontana in a Sept. 15 letter. “HART wants to reiterate our concern regarding the lack of the above personnel.”
Fontana recently declined to respond to several questions on the matter, including why HART was still asking Ansaldo to fill those jobs in September if they had already been filled. He deferred to HART to answer any further questions on the issue.
They newly obtained letters further show that Ansaldo has struggled over the past year to keep all of its key positions staffed — or to hire qualified candidates — to HART’s satisfaction.
In at least one instance, Ansaldo appointed someone to a key management role without HART’s consent or approval, and the rail agency found that person lacked the necessary experience, according to a May 3 letter from Garrod.
However, HART opted to conditionally approve the Ansaldo staffer, who was hired to serve as an interface manager during construction, because she demonstrated she was capable of doing the job. The rail agency is slated to review her approval again in October, according to Garrod’s letter.
HART flagged 15 or so positions dubbed “key” or “critical” between July and April that Ansaldo needed to fill to keep progress going smoothly. Correspondence shows that Ansaldo has filled at least five of those positions.
Garrod described the Ansaldo staffing as a “work in progress” in a recent emailed message sent via HART spokesman Bill Brennan.
“Some Ansaldo employees have left to take promotions at other companies. Maintaining adequate staffing levels will continue to be a challenge throughout this entire project due to the location and extremely hot construction climate,” Brennan’s message stated. “But it will be a challenge we will continue to monitor and address.”
Garrod further downplayed the concerns expressed in HART’s letters to Ansaldo.
“No impacts have been realized due to staffing vacancies. HART is working collaboratively with (Ansaldo) to make sure that we have a fully staffed team ready to meet the needs of the project,” Garrod stated in another email sent by Brennan.
Ansaldo has increased its staffing on Oahu by more than 40 percent over the past year, to 37 employees from 26, and it plans to have 50 local employees by the end of the year, according to Garrod.
The firm delivered the first train cars on time in March.
Brennan said that the urgency expressed in Garrod’s letters could potentially give the local Ansaldo office more leverage to request the staffing it needs from its company headquarters in Italy.
Ansaldo has been contracted to operate the planned 20-mile, 21-station elevated system across Oahu’s South Shore. However, rail officials now say they won’t be able to build the entire system so it reaches town on the project’s current budget of about $6.9 billion. The island’s top political leadership, including Mayor Kirk Caldwell, has recommended the city complete the system at Middle Street for now.
It remains to be seen how such changes would affect Ansaldo’s contract with the rail project.
VACANCIES NOTED
>> July 15: HART tells Ansaldo that it “is concerned that the continued vacancies of Key Personnel and other important positions are affecting (rail’s) progress. Without immediate action to have these personnel available in Honolulu, many on-going and future issues will not be addressed in a timely manner, which will further affect the Project’s progress.”
>> Aug. 18: HART approves Ansaldo’s pick for a new communications lead engineer, to replace the outgoing one.
>> Sept. 15: HART tells Ansaldo that the “continued absence of many Key Personnel and many critical positions is unacceptable.” The agency reminds the firm that it’s been two months since it first brought up the issue, and adds that “without immediate action to have these personnel available in Honolulu as soon as possible, the Project’s progress will be further impacted and any corrective actions, as a result, will become more difficult.” It asks Ansaldo for an “immediate action plan” to fill the vacancies.
>> Oct. 9: Ansaldo Honolulu Principal Program Manager and Managing Director Enrico Fontana tells the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that “all but the field supervisor positions were filled by Ansaldo specialists” when the firm received HART’s July 15 concerns over vacancies.
>> Oct. 27: HART accepts Ansaldo’s picks for a new traction electrification lead engineer and a new communications lead engineer.
>> Nov. 17: HART accepts Ansaldo’s pick for a new project controls manager.
>> March 11: HART accepts Ansaldo’s temporary pick for a safety and security certification manager to perform that job for the next four months.
>> April 13: HART expresses more concerns about the “lack of personnel required to support on-going (Ansaldo) Core Systems activities on the Honolulu Rail Transit project.” The rail agency acknowledges that Ansaldo has filled some jobs, but more vacancies are “again causing major concern.”
>> May 3: HART accepts Ansaldo’s pick for a new interface manager, even though Ansaldo already designated the new manager without HART’s approval. The rail agency says the new manager lacks the proper experience, but it finds that she has demonstrated she’s capable. HART grants conditional approval.
123 responses to “Firm creating rail cars has staffing problems”
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By the time the Rail is ready for those Steel Rail cars it will be at least 5 years. Talk about a total waste of Money, HOW SAD.
Another wooden stake into the inept HART of the $29.5 Billion Dollar TITANIC RAIL SCAM from no where to no where and much more than a Blight!!!
STOP ORGANIZED CRIME!!!
VOTE OUT ALL INCUMBENTS!!!
RUSTY THE HATED RAIL REARS ITS UGLY HEAD AGAIN & AGAIN. built on a bed of lies, deception and Backroom Cash laden deals. Ansaldo is the company that has convictions for Cash bribes in other areas but in Hawaii they played Golf ( yah right) who are they kidding. the RAIL GUIDE WAYS NEED TO STOP AT THE STADIUM AND THE EXISTING GUIDE WAY TURNED INTO A REVERSABLE HIGHWAY. Just think it would be used 7 days a week by most of Waianae, Makaha, Nanakuli, Maili, Honokai Hale and Kapolei residents. very little if any maintenance and no overhead or electricity costs and no new power plant and bribes would be non existent. and the big plus we could air condition the schools If we can find an honest contractor in . THINK HAWAII THINK AND VOTE OUT ALL OF THE INCOMBENTS ON THE CITY COUNCIL AND MAYORS RACES. VOTE IN TOM BERG AND GET RID OF PINE & ELEPAHNTE
Why is this not a surprise?
WAKE UP HAWAII!!! If we don’t, we and generations to come will pay for it.
I have never seen so many people who just want to give up on rail. To accomplish anything you have to meet the problems and challenges head on. We would have never won World War II, if everyone said let’s give up, it’s too costly in lives and material. It must be the slacker mentality that prevails here. Is it any wonder, we have such a number of people who have little education, with no marketable skills or talent, unemployed homeless people, and high incarceration rates. Those are symptoms of people who do not even try to solve and perservere against all obstacles and problems
Vector says: “I have never seen so many people who just want to give up on rail. To accomplish anything you have to meet the problems and challenges head on. We would have never won World War II, if everyone said let’s give up, it’s too costly in lives and material.”
Please tell me you’re joking.
WWII was about freedom, the holocaust, and democracy.
This train is about enriching some construction contractors, developers and other insiders on the backs of struggling local families.
I think the comparison you are looking for is “we’d still have a house and savings if dad didn’t keep doubling down at the blackjack table and losing every hand because he doesn’t want to think of himself as a quitter.”
Because that’s exactly what this project has turned into. Mayor Caldwell and HART got everything they asked for and made a giant mess of things. If they were teenage boys, you’d take their car keys away and make them get jobs.
Kalaheo is a wus. Without rail our children and grandchildren have no future.
Stopping rail now will put a lot of construction workers out of work. And with all the developers of affordable housing and rental units depending on the completion of rail, those buildings will not be built. There goes any future of reducing our homeless problem. The ripple effect of all those lost construction and development jobs, would send our unemployment numbers up, State and City tax revenues down, and our economy into a downward spiral into recession. Our economy is booming, and the construction market is super hot. All of this will be reversed if rail is not completed as planned and designed. You can thank all the rail opponents, if we end up in another bad recession, and everyone is worst off.
Affordable housing and rental units can still be built and completed without rail. Rail was supposed to be about traffic relief and your statement just proves more of the same, that rail had nothing to do with traffic but everything to do with development.
Vector, just how many real and actual local jobs will be lost if they fire everyone tied to the rail?
Can you post how many workers are actually working and building the rail on any given day?
Every time I’ve passed by the construction, I see maybe 10 construction workers. Prove me wrong, share your numbers with sources.
Affordable housing and rentals can only be built by keeping the construction cost down. When you design affordable housing and rentals, the cost can be reduced my not building as many parking stalls per unit. The Zoning code allows this reduction in parking stalls, because they consider people living around and in the vicinity of rail stations and along the rail line, will be using the rail as the primary means of transportation. The rail line has other objectives besides moving people. 1) confining urban growth to the rail corridor along the Leeward side of Oahu, to prevent urban sprawl across the whole island, and destroying our agricultural and conservation land. In other words, not paving paradise. 2)Rail is an investment in the future development of affordable housing, rentals, businesses, and communities along the rail guide way and around the rail stations. Rail is an investment and stimulus for continued economic growth of the communities along the rail line and around the rail stations.
As for jobs, there are many people who are in someway connected to rail. The urban planners, the transit planners, and designers, all the Federal, State and City government agencies and departments working on this project, the Contractors, the subcontractors and all the material and equipment vendors and suppliers. Those people spend their incomes in our community, generating more business and employment for our community. The booming construction industry and the rail construction has made our State one of the best performing in the nation, let alone the world. The world economy is doing terribly, nationally we are better off, however Hawaii Nei beats them all
Vector,
A one track rail to nowhere doesn’t over enough ground so that condo owners don’ need a car.
Oh please, the construction market is so hot for luxury condos that the Developers are bringing in Mainland workers. That’s what driving up the costs of construction everywhere, too much work and not enough workers.
Vector wrote: “”The ripple effect of all those lost construction and development jobs, would send our unemployment numbers up, State and City tax revenues down, and our economy into a downward spiral into recession. ”
My goodness, aren’t we dramatic this afternoon!
You realize than even with their bloated administration up in Ali’i Tower, this expensive mess has still only hired about 1000 local people and flown in 1000 more. AND this is in a red hot construction market where construction companies are flying in workers. Maybe those rail workers can go install the A/C in our sweltering schools that they’re all too busy to do now.
You’re correct that there’s an economic benefit to this, as well as an opportunity to significantly increase our stock of affordable housing, which will absolutely not happen without TOD (and you need transit, as in fixed rail transit, to have transit oriented development). Despite the jobs and other economic benefits, rail shouldn’t be looked at as a make-work project, since it will deliver significant transportation benefits, in addition to housing.
This nightmare never ends. It’s all about theft, always has been. Mufi should be in jail, along with many others, but if the folks don’t rise-up and put a stop to this bs, they deserve everything that comes their way.
There is a lot of competition for construction workers building the rail guide way, the luxury condos, the affordable housing and rentals, and the malls and commercial buildings in Honolulu. The fierce competition for the workers by all these building sectors is driving up building costs.
Well, then, just think how affordable it will be building “affordable workforce housing” instead of luxury condos when those rail construction workers become available.
Talk about a win win!
Just get the unions to do their job and provide trained workers instead of the ones that cant read or write.
Justification to break the contract! Break it now, save $Billions!
Agree!!!
Not really. Nei already has some rail cars. Who else will build the replacements? And at what costs?
Geez you guys ever had to hire professionals lately. Getting experienced engineers in just hard, all the good ones are employed and their employers are holding on to them. There is so much competition for professionals; we we recruiting for this one position and found ourselves competing agiinst several other firms. Working on our candidate no. 4 now, upped salary by 10 percent and still not sure if we are going to land him. I can see why Hitachi is having problems hiring staff. They are probably fishing in the same stream that the rest of us are and there are few fish left. Mainland guys sniff around, but the cost of living scares them. One guys said he went to see a one bedroom renting for $1,650, he freaked out when he saw the unit was an old walk-up in Makiki.
They are still looking for “engineers”? Most of the design and engineering should be done by now. They should only need a fraction of the engineers they started with to fix problem areas and changes (which I hope they stop making).
The waste of money would be to stop rail at Middle Street. It would drive ridership down by not stopping at heavily populated areas in Honolulu.
Please tell me more about the “heavily populated” Ala Moana Luxury Mall that is across the street form the park?
Rail will continue to Ala Mo then UH. Money will be available.
Where is this money going to come from?
Property tax? The promised “temporary” rail tax? How about a concrete tax?
People in Honolulu constantly run red lights and disobey traffic. Seen 3 light runners and near pedestrian accidents. Honolulu needs rail to get these people off the roads. The city should not have ANY street parking in the City. Charge monthly fees for parking. Rail was made for Kalihi to Ala Moana core. This will be the greatest on/off transport corridor. Rail will help middle class families the most. People have you receive a bill yet for $4,000 yet? It’s 3/4 finished. Have you got any bill? Why are the markets,Costco,malls,restaurants, movies, etc.etc. all crowded? How can they pay this rail bill and still have all this money? The NO GANG propaganda.
What lies. Every single time people buy necessities such as food and meds, they are paying for rail. Why are lines long at Costco? Because people need to cut corners to save some money. Even though you can claim that the extra GET is “hardly felt”, Hawaii has so many “hardly felt taxes.
If you get poked with a needle, that may not be a big deal bit if you’re a pin cushion, it starts to get painful doesn’t it?
And the incompetence and mismanagement continues. Unanswered and unfulfilled staffing issues, contracts let prematurely, foolish plan-and-engineer-as-you-go/build, insufficient impact statements/reports, ignoring utility concerns, inadequate security at the rail car storage site resulting in hours-long graffiti activities (albeit, it was some pretty nice looking graffiti, floor to roof of the car), ballooning costs, delayed construction, significant engineering change orders. I’m sure there are more problems that I missed. This rail project is ridikulus, and I wish someone could fix it with a wave of a wand.
Looks like Ansaldo is just a competent as HART.
But this is not news. Its part of the total corruption going back to Mufi and continuing on. FACT: Ansalado was literally thrown out of N. Europe and prosecuted for what they did and tried to do on past rail projects. With this business history, only though graft and payola would Hawaii Dems pick them to do rail!
INCOMPETENT IS THE WORD
“a traction electrification lead engineer”- how about a job description for this. An Electrical Engineer won’t do? “interface manager”- isn’t that the Project Manager’s function? Why can’t these positions be filled by local, on-island folks? If on the same level as those folks on the HART Board, the qualifications can’t be too difficult.
Need someone with experience with rail transit systems using third rail electrification.
Of course, by your definition, they won’t find them in Hawaii since we have no rail transit system. Then you have to convince someone to either move to Hawaii (median home price north of $700K) to take a job that the buyer (C&C) is trying to truncate, or have someone here who has the experience to come out of retirement to work for the circus and deal with the political wrangling.
Good luck with that.
Actually there are probably a lot of retired and experienced kupuna who would like to take a temporary entry level position. The lead could be a part-time consultant. It would take about 6 months to get up to speed.
We aren’t talking about “entry level” positions here. Would you PLEASE read the article instead of just making thing s up.
uku – Stop the presses. You have actually admitted no one affiliated with Nei rail has no experience. YESSSS!!!!
Mark this date on the calendar. Uku has finally admitted to the utter incompetence of Nei rail management.
Talk about a train wreck? Here it is.
LOL!!!
I’m sure Ansaldo people saw the writing on the wall (failing company) and did a “Titanic”…RAN to the rescue boats and ABANDONED ship!!
This was always a failing company. They were just the company that bribed the right people, you cant bet on that!
Can not can’t sorry
IRT: retire, and the train hasn’t moved!
I suppose we’ve already paid them more than the cars that have been delivered !!!
Too late to change to another company???
Citizens of the State of Hawaii,
We have written some very strong missives (long, stern and official letters) to the rail car provider. Everything is going as planned. Please don’t be worried. One must remember that living in a dream world can be challenging. We can make the required and necessary adjustments from the newly leased Kapalama Hale on our new city letter head.
With your interest in mind,
Captain Kirk,
Commander of the Intergalactic Starship US EEnterprise
And Rail will Built on Time and on Budget. (:]
I am shocked by this totally unexpected turn of events.
Who could have ever predicted that a notoriously difficult company, known for their shoddy trains, institutional corruption, and poor reputation, would skimp on hiring skilled employees and then lie repeatedly about it?
Just more “bad luck” I suppose.
Really bad luck for the Oahu residents STOP THE CHOO CHOO AND MAKE IT A REVESABLE HIGHWAY- WAKE UP HONOLULU AND THINK.
We could save BILLIONS OF HARD EARNED TAX DOLLARS
“HART hasn’t yet issued the two big contracts to complete rail’s final 10 miles”.
The first 10 miles ends at Aloha Stadium.
The practical and best option is to convert the rail guide way to a 2-lane HOV(2) Reversible freeway from Kapolei to Aloha Stadium for less than $4 Billion already collected via GET. Tampa has built a Reversible Express Lane for $42 million per mile in year 2006, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkM-MC3N-oY. The Tampa elevated highway structure is built similar to the Oahu Rail guide way.
Yo got it! Reverse the tax dollars to something useful like our infrastructure. Our roads, our sewer lines, our water mains, don’t forget about that. Oh, don’t forget our third world airport. Not really, third world airports are much nicer!
STOP THE CHOO CHOO, AND WE WILL BE THROWING BILLIONS OF DOLLARS OF OUR TAX MONEY AWAY, THAT WE HAVE ALREADY INVESTED IN RAIL. AND STOPPING IT AT MIDDLE ST WOULD GREATLY REDUCE THE RIDERSHIP, MAKING THE INVESTMENT A WHITE ELEPHANT
Stop the choo-choo and we will save even more billions, as well as keeping our state from going bankrupt.
Vector says: “STOP THE CHOO CHOO, AND WE WILL BE THROWING BILLIONS OF DOLLARS OF OUR TAX MONEY AWAY, THAT WE HAVE ALREADY INVESTED IN RAIL.”
Walk away form the blackjack table and you will throwing thousands of dollars in savings away that you have already invested in that jackpot.
See how silly that line of thinking is.
HART and Mayor Caldwell have demonstrated time and time again that they are incapable of managing this project despite promising to bring it in “on time and on budget.”
Then we have rail cheerleaders like yourself who ignore the grim news about the shoddy, shady, corrupt Ansaldo and blather on about how stopping the train will trigger a recession state wide. Please stop the silliness, we already have wilily and ukuleleblue denying reality, we don’t need another out of touch goofball trying to defend the indefensible.
NO PROBLEM…NO NEED DAT MANY CARS, BCOZ NOT GOIN HAVE DAT MANY RIDERS.
Good news! Big time failure for HART’s ancient steel rail technology.
END THE OAHU RAIL PROJECT NOW
When every thing is said and done about contract awarding, ironic that Hitachi is now making the actual rail cars, while the cost over runs begins to come in exceeding the bids tendered by the competitors? Hanky-panky for sure.
HARD LUCK NO?
“HART finds an Adsaldo staffer lacked the necessary experience”. Wow, pot calling kettle black! Grabby has experience – Total failure on the Boston Big Dig. Who hired him? Problem – He’s still here.
Thank you Mufi along with your managing director (and current mayor) Caldwell for the lies and forcing this upon us. And don’t forget Carlisle for continuing this farce during his term and for continued support even as all the lies and corruption are uncovered almost daily.
Don’tt forget Nestor, Todd, Breene, Donovan DelaCruz, Chang, Cachola, PRP, Winer, etc, etc. Only Lingle, Berg, Cayetano and his group tried to put the brakes on this project. The Oahu rail project was a scam from day and many people kmew about it except too many others allowed themsleves to be manipulated and Gruberized and yet they will suffer just as badly. All local non-construction union rank and file like HGEA AND HSTA are and will continue to get raked over the tax coals just as just as bad as everyone else AND they will stuck in WORSENING gridlock traffic be becasue of the rail project and even if the rail line line goes to Ala Mo Center. This is what happens when people act like lemmings or sheep and allow themsleves to be Animal Farmed by the ruling elite such as Mufi then Kirk and the rest and all connected to the unions at the hip with greased palms extended to receive the envelopes of luv.
Let’s not forget White of PRP as he was the one who was selling lies to our gullible public about Ben Cayetano. Not to worry tho folks as another huge project will come along and the developers will make it shine for our gullible voters to heartily vote YES. Oahu, you got what you deserved.
Yes we got more people employed, planning, designing and building rail, and affordable housing and rentals around the rail stations
Vector says: “Yes we got more people employed, planning, designing and building rail, ”
Yes and they are doing a TERRIBLE at it. Read the story above about the corrupt and difficult Ansaldo who is living up to their reputation of poor service and dishonesty. You know DC Metro LITERALLY true away all their Ansaldo train cars rather than waste more time and money dealing with them. That’s how bad they are.
And you think that the fact they are taking BILLIONS of our tax dollars is somehow a good reason to keep this theft going?! Did you bump your head, or are you in the construction industry? I’m thinking maybe both.
What a joke. Big bucks to build and no workers to run it. And who is in control of it the City or private entity. They also should give the public a ballpark figure on how much it would cost to ride the Rail. Most of this should have been done in the beginning.
How can they give a ballpark figure on rail tickets when they haven’t given an honest estimate to build the required new fossil fuel electrical generator, the expected cost of the train electric bill which will easily be over $100 MILLION per year and the honest cost on train maintenance where this steel on steel turn of the century train technology will NOT fare well in Hawaii year round humid and salt-air corrosive environment. Expect train maintenance costs to be about $80-100 million in ‘Hawaii dollars’. If the Aloha stadium maintenance is like $40 million plus per and it does not even have lots of moving parts with lots of electrical amd electronics hardware that local electricians and engineers have ZERO experience in rail repair and maintenace. They cannot just Google how to repair a train that only one other driverless steel on steel train in the world exists today.
Agree. And those people who say no, just look at the “steel” stadium monstrosity. The same crooked polit-bureau claimed then now an in the future…”we didn’t know we would have all this rust in a salt air climate”
AND the next big secret that no one will address or talk about is that HECO and all the energy people have stated that rail will require another power plant and total grid upgrade to support it. What will that cost?Be very fearful that no one in the crook-caldwell camp will even talk about it!
In the end, they’ll transport lava from the Big Island to power the steam engine on the choo-choo since they can’t find any qualified builder/engineer to build them what’s needed.
Can’t do fossil new fuel. Legislature outlawed new fossil fuel. Have to cover all of the former pineapple fields from Wahiawa to Haleiwa with solar panels and build about 10 offshore wind farm to do it or run the sixty-mile underwater extension cord from the proposed Lanai wind farm (which costs about $3 billion)
“… letters could potentially give the local Ansaldo office more leverage to request the staffing it needs from its company headquarters in Italy.”
No one from Italy is going to want to come here to work. You can’t find any good pizza in Hawaii.
I couldn’t find good Pizza in Italy either. The quality of train graffiti is much higher here than in Rome.
I have had enough of bad news. The good news is that the best pizza in the world can be found in the neighborhood centered on Arthur Avenue and 187th Street in the Bronx.
So the RAIL, has been using a secret sweatshop manual labor force, to construct the Honolulu railroad cars, and the money doesn’t go to pay the laborers ?
We need some guts to get involved with this rail fiasco and our Mayor needs to call China and get a bid to finish this stupid project. China could probably finish this rail project in 2-3 years for far less than the project 8 billion dollars.
The amazing things they build in China like a freeway over the sea in a MATTER OF A FEW YEARS. We are gettng skrewed by beauracracy and unions, time to get some guts.
“The issue over Ansaldo vacancies — and HART’s concerns — first surfaced in October.”>>> The issue/concern over Ansaldo surfaced LOOOOONG before October. The same concerns which has now resulted in their October staffing issues. Remember? Back then Ansaldo said their company problems were with another division of Ansaldo and since they slapped a “different name” on the Hawaii project, that magically shielded Hawaii from the same company problems.
Best news HART could have received! At least it’ll keep the TAGGERS from putting more graffiti on the rail cars. Makes you wonder how the Securitas security firm could not monitor the rail cars at the housing plant. We pay thousands of bucks for security cams, guards, and the culprits still damage the rail cars. Only in Hawaii!!!
I’ve never understood why Ansaldo was chosen. It was obvious that Bombardier and Sumitomo were the better choices.
Reason:
former CEO Hart Horner ->former CEO 1st Hwn Bnk ->Bank PNB Paribas->Finmeccanica (Now Leonardo Finmeccanica) ->Ansald Breda (now Hitachi) ->Ansaldo Hawaii
Three contractors bid: Mitsubishi, Bombardier and Ansaldo. Bombardier’s bid was thrown out and Anslado bid why they there not licensed to business in Hawaii. HOWEVER unlike Bombardier that was completely banned from bidding, Ansaldo paid a small fine and was allowed to continue as a bidder. Had Mufi become Gov, Bombardier who donated over $80K to Mufi’s campaign most likely would have won the Oahu rail bid.
Ansaldo seemed to have the inside track on the rail car contract from the start despite the deep financial troubles of its Italian parent Finmeccanica, a spotty performance record in other cities and its lack of necessary Hawaii licenses.
What Ansaldo did have was local political connections: In addition to Enomoto, Ansaldo listed Jeff Coelho, city managing director under former Mayor Mufi Hannemann, as a company executive and Carolyn Tanaka, Hannemann’s spokeswoman when he ran for governor, as the company’s spokeswoman.
As the Ansaldo contract came to a head before the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation, HART board member Ivan Lui-Kwan disclosed to the Ethics Commission that Ansaldo had asked another partner at his law firm to be its legal counsel.
The Ansaldo contract was steered through the HART board by its finance chairman, Don Horner, then the CEO of First Hawaiian Bank, whose French parent company, BNP Paribas, has major financial ties to Finmeccanica….
Can anybody tell me who made the choice of Ansaldo? If it was some board who were the members? Also the councilmembers who voted for this project?
Just follow the money.
Follow the money and connect the dots: Ansaldo, a failing Italian company, borrows $800 million from PNB Paribas (European bank conglomerate) to stay afloat. Bank of the West is a subsidiary of PNB. Walter Dods Jr., former CEO of First Hawaiian Bank is a member of the Board of Directors of BOW. First Hawaiian is a subsidiary of BOW. Don Horner, who followed Dods as CEO of FHB, suddenly quits his job and becomes the finance chair of HART. HART chooses the near bankrupt company Ansaldo over two fiscally healthy companies, Hitachi and Bombardier to build the trains. Coincidence?
Great analysis!
errata–Mitsubishi, not Hitachi…according to Inverse. Regardless, you should get the point.
Everyday there seems to be another problem with the runaway train from nowhere to nowhere. Time to tear it down to cut the unknown losses. How much will the power plant cost to build? How much will electricity cost? What will security cost? No answers… By the way is Caldwell out of town again? Whenever the heat is on the rail, Caldwell disappears. Why is Grabby still on the job???? Everything about the rail shows he and HART are failures.
Grabby is here because he was hired to be a mercenary punching bag. Most of the bad, bankrupting decisions were made before he arrived. But with his experience with the failure of Boson’s Big Dig, he showed himself to be adept at surviving whithering attacks on his “leadership.”
The Boston Dig has been a boon to whole areas of Boston that have been connected by the tunnel. Large corporations are moving their headquarters to those areas, new commercial and business enterprises are developing in those areas.
That doesn’t change the fact the it was an obscenely expensive project that also shot billions over budget with very little oversight and lots of insiders slopping at the trough.
Boston was left with a bunch of useful roads though. We are getting a train from DR Horton’s new development past luxury condo for wealthy foreign nationals to the fancy tourist mall, and the people it was promised to and are paying for it was forgotten.
You’re right. Boston came out way ahead compared to this.
The Art on the rail cars should have said STOP RAIL BEFORE ITS TO LATE & Hawai’i is Bankrupt w/o a functioning alternative to driving your car!
Beautiful rail cars. Sickening to see them defaced.
You’re three days behind on your “more bad news for this mess of rail project.”
Look at the top of the page. Notoriously corrupt and difficult rail maker Ansaldo is once again being being difficult and providing shoddy service.
Say, aren’ they the same ones contracted to maintain these trains with and are being promised a fortune at the end of construction to make their bid artificially lower and hide their payment off the rail construction budget? Yes, yes they are.
Now, is today the day you finally reveal where it is that you live on the main and what your connection is to this mess of a rail project? I’m guessing you are still too cowardly to do so.
Uku is local cause he comments on many other non-rail Hawaii news stories. From Mayor’s inner circle, PRP or other Demo/union insider.
Uku, get used to it. The pillars are next then the stations when built.
after the pillers are tagged some brave ones are going to hang over the side and tag the sides of the rail line. More exposure cuz it’s going through busy corridors not the the freeway which is out of the way.
Why do you care? You don’t live here.
Okay who is surprised? Certainly not me!!!
And by the way where are the 4 thousand to 10 thousand workers that we were told that would be working on the rail once building got started? I believe it was either Mufi and or Caldwell who said that. Why does the rail have to go to Ala Moana? Is everyone going shopping? Speaker Souki helping the Mayor put on a fundraiser and will next either have a bill in the legislature or something to extend the rail tax even further. Did;t like the what he said about Hawaii having the lowest property taxes in the nation. He does;t care since Maui property taxes will not be going ip. Why does;t the legislature use money that that gave to the rail to build up UH West Oahu. Maybe that could solve the problem of everyone having to go to Manoa.
Before the rail project began, half of the Building Contractors and subcontractors were out of work. Now they cannot find enough trained and experienced people, and are now recruiting on the mainland. You may not see them shoveling dirt, but they are working on the rail metro project and all the other commercial and residential projects
Just more fuel to the fire that proves Ansaldo should not have been picked to supply the vehicles to this ill-conceived project. First it was not being licensed before submitting their bid to being understaffed. What a Major this thing has been from the start.
Ansaldo was pushed by Horner. Now look at where we are by going with a firm that only has the outdated stuff. Now we are supposed to feel sorry because they have staffing problems? Probably have those problems because lots of workers feel shame to work on that and go elsewhere.
No surprise here. Ansaldo should have never been selected especially after it became public knowledge that the company was in financial trouble and the trains they
had built for other systems were not up to snuff. Yet, our political leaders chose to go with Ansaldo nonetheless.
In this whole process has anything been done right. Not as far as I can tell. Expect more of the same if this project is not ended soon.
Just have to laugh at HART. How ironic they are questioning staffing quality. Look at themselves first. Ridiculous.
And first it was MATRA elevated train that got voted down herr. Accused of government corruption and brivery with huge budget overges in Taiwan. Route didn’t make sense either. Now we have the successor system from Ansaldo with yet another nightmare. I know Mufi and Waihee came out to Asia and saw our transit systems like the MATRA. Obviously didn’t learn a thing other than it was built. And I met with them out there. Thick as thieves and dumb as blocks of cement.
Exactly what happens when you willfully select the low bidder of questionable integrity and quality. You get what you pay for.
Mayor is enamored with bikeways in busy corridors, here’s his chance to have the most expensive bikeway in the world. Ridership will probably be the same with rail.
The other rail car contractors that originally bid on this fiasco are laughing at city/hart and saying I told you so. Ansaldo had a history of problems with other projects, but that didn’t stop city/hart from awarding the contract.
Because they know if Rail ever operates, it will be delayed.
Looks like the positions are being filled. Rail is brand new in Hawaii. Of course it’s hard to find experience people.
Please read the story again. Ansaldo has been LYING about filling those positions.
This project is in dire need of adult supervision.
Baloney. You dont read.. Here’s a quote…
” >> May 3: HART accepts Ansaldo’s pick for a new interface manager, even though Ansaldo already designated the new manager without HART’s approval. The rail agency says the new manager lacks the proper experience, but it finds that she has demonstrated she’s capable. HART grants conditional approval.”
Ansaldo has been filling those positions by in-house training.
Who do you think you’re fooling? Certainly not anyone who can read:
“At that time Ansaldo’s project manager in Hawaii told the Star-Advertiser that the firm had already filled most of the positions in question months earlier, before HART raised the issue in July.
However, the recently obtained letters show that HART was still demanding that Ansaldo fill those key positions in September.”
Penalize the contractor. Make them pay dearly.
This story is really just a non story. This letter and correspondence trail of information was reported on last summer.
Lets see, when Ansaldo was selected the cars and core system cost around 575 million. Or about 16.5 % of the total 3.5 billion dollars cost.
Now the project has increased to 8 billion, and yes Ansaldos cost to the city has gone up by 5 million, less than 1%!
Today using the estimated project cost of 8 billion dollars, Ansaldo’s cost of 580 million accounts for only 7.25 %.percent of the total project cost.
If only the rest of the contractors had performed as well as Ansaldo from a cost stand point , the rail transit project would still be under $5 billion.
Whats the real story ? Instead of HART complaining about Ansaldo’s staffing, they should be asking why every other contractor seems hell bent on just increasing cost everyday.
Oh by the way, the first train arrived on time. And just because HART is so over staffed its no reason to attack the one contractor who has delivered on time while holding cost down.
Hey JeffyC. Who do you work for 🙂 I’m guessing Ansaldo.
And Ansaldo has put in a lot of change orders and in case you didn’t notice, this story has nothing to do with your silly self-serving math exercise and everything to do with Ansaldo providing dismal service and lying about it… just like they do everywhere else.
Do you have any comment beyond “oh, that’s been going on for years”?
Facts not fiction. The only change order came from Hart…to go with a four car train instead of two.
And now backed by Hitachi. Plus go look at the other two bids…both at least 100 million higher and both were front loaded with high percentages on intial mobilization. Would have meant more money for the city to come up with on day one. Fact the first four cars are here on time. Fact even the story points out that hiring is up 26%. As for Kalaheo great high school basketball team and close to Kalama beach…all facts and nothing but the facts
jeffyjc says: “Plus go look at the other two bids…both at least 100 million higher and both were front loaded with high percentages on intial mobilization. Would have meant more money for the city to come up with on day one.”
Yeah, so now it doesn’t appear in any budget anywhere and those last minute games allowed the notoriously corrupt Ansaldo to submit an artificially low bid.
You sure do know a lot about Ansaldo. Is that some sort of hobby or are you related to the company?
Ansaldo has done a good job. Their selection is well vindicated.
Would you please read the article.
You’r constant stream of lies isn’t helping anyone and just makes rail look even more out of control. If you can’t defend this rail project without resorting to lies, then you can’t support this rail project.
I saw Kirk on the news the other night, he is starting to look like Kenny Rogers.
How much does each one of those cars cost
And what else would you expect doing business with a bankrupt firm?