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Chile Recruiting Center Blasted
Police are investigating Thursday traces of a bomb that tore the door off an Army recruiting center, an action that left pamphlets inside criticizing the police, prison system and the new urban transportation service.
Chile Recruiting Center Blasted
Santiago de Chile, Feb 15 (Prensa Latina) Police are investigating Thursday traces of a bomb that tore the door off an Army recruiting center, an action that left pamphlets inside criticizing the police, prison system and the new urban transportation service.
According to Vice Major Victor Torrez it was more of a noise bomb, but very powerful.
Initial versions claimed the device detonated shortly before midnight in the recruiting unit in the Providencia town and the pamphlets are signed by an unknown group called Federacion Revuelta 14-F Gaetano Bresci Brigade.
- - -
Gaetano Bresci was an Italian-American anarchist who assassinated Italian King Umberto I.
- - -
The communique, in Spanish, about this action by the Federación Revuelta 14F - Brigada Gaetano Bresci can be found here:
http://hommodolars.cl/e107/news.php?extend.1343
In it they state:
"There is no revolution of words or posturing, only of thought that transforms into insurrectionary action."
"Long live the conspiracy against the State!"
"Against the police of the concertación* and all the police: destruction to all the centers of abduction and torture. Trevor Oyarzún**, you are in sight!!!!"
Fire to capital, breaking with the micros*** and then with the soldiers!!!! Against the jails of the State and Capital; escape, mutiny and subversion!!!"
* Post-Pinochet government
** Police subprefect of the Brigada de Robos Metropolitana de Santiago (Robberies Brigade of Santiago)
*** Urban buses of Santiago
- - -
CHILE: TRANSANTIAGO FIASCO: ANOTHER DAY OF FREE RIDES
(February 14, 2007) Santiago residents enjoyed another day of free bus rides on Tuesday when the “Bip” card readers in many buses failed to work properly.
The bus system faced its first real test on Monday, the fist working day since the system’s inauguration on Saturday. After a first day full of delays, overcrowding and rioting, Transport Minister Sergio Espejo announced that five private transport companies will face fines for failing to comply with new regulations.
Many Santiaguinos arrived late to work on Monday, citing transport problems as the reason for their tardiness. Journey times were extended by a third on average.
The government of Chile warned that Santiago companies would face fines if they fired workers for tardiness Monday, and urged anyone dismissed because of Transantiago problems to contact authorities.
Transport problems were most severe around the Escuela Militar area, where a crowd of 1,000 people gathered at 7.30 a.m., stranded by the infrequency of buses. After waits of over an hour, many took to the street, trying to stop buses that were passing by, and police were forced to intervene.
On Monday evening, several buses were hijacked and drivers were forced to change their route. Two buses heading to Pudahuel and Maipú had to divert to Quilicura, as angry passengers complained that there were no longer any buses heading in that direction.
The government said Monday that private companies were largely to blame for the system’s overcrowding, as they had failed to produce the fleet that was necessary to cope with the number of passengers at peak times. Transport Minister Sergio Espejo said that he did not rule out adding more buses to the fleet.
“Public transport is here to serve the people, not the other way around,” said Espejo. “If we need more buses, then we will have more.”
It was also revealed Monday that five of the system’s private operators will face fines for the “sub-par” service that was offered over the first weekend of the Transantiago plan. The exact amount of the fines is as yet unknown.
For right-wing Independent Democratic Union Party (UDI) secretary-general Darío Paya, the Transport Ministry’s announcements were not enough. Paya called for the city’s old yellow micro-buses to be added to the Transantiago fleet to avoid a collapse of the system.
“We can’t have people herded together like cattle in the streets,” said Paya, who went on to refer to the system as “an intelligible soup of irresponsibility.”
After a weekend of free rides for passengers, it was hoped that the bus payment system would return to normal on Tuesday. However, at the last minute it was announced that buses would be free once again, as 15 percent of the “Bip” card machines were not working.
Not all was bad news for the Transantiago’s first few days. It emerged on Tuesday that the Metro was running smoothly, despite a 43 percent increase in passengers.
“We’re very pleased,” said Metro president Blas Tomic. “We’ve had no setbacks at all, apart from a few minor problems.”
SOURCES: EL MERCURIO, LA TERCERA, LA NACIÓN
By Cate Setterfield (editor [at] santiagotimes.cl)
Santiago de Chile, Feb 15 (Prensa Latina) Police are investigating Thursday traces of a bomb that tore the door off an Army recruiting center, an action that left pamphlets inside criticizing the police, prison system and the new urban transportation service.
According to Vice Major Victor Torrez it was more of a noise bomb, but very powerful.
Initial versions claimed the device detonated shortly before midnight in the recruiting unit in the Providencia town and the pamphlets are signed by an unknown group called Federacion Revuelta 14-F Gaetano Bresci Brigade.
- - -
Gaetano Bresci was an Italian-American anarchist who assassinated Italian King Umberto I.
- - -
The communique, in Spanish, about this action by the Federación Revuelta 14F - Brigada Gaetano Bresci can be found here:
http://hommodolars.cl/e107/news.php?extend.1343
In it they state:
"There is no revolution of words or posturing, only of thought that transforms into insurrectionary action."
"Long live the conspiracy against the State!"
"Against the police of the concertación* and all the police: destruction to all the centers of abduction and torture. Trevor Oyarzún**, you are in sight!!!!"
Fire to capital, breaking with the micros*** and then with the soldiers!!!! Against the jails of the State and Capital; escape, mutiny and subversion!!!"
* Post-Pinochet government
** Police subprefect of the Brigada de Robos Metropolitana de Santiago (Robberies Brigade of Santiago)
*** Urban buses of Santiago
- - -
CHILE: TRANSANTIAGO FIASCO: ANOTHER DAY OF FREE RIDES
(February 14, 2007) Santiago residents enjoyed another day of free bus rides on Tuesday when the “Bip” card readers in many buses failed to work properly.
The bus system faced its first real test on Monday, the fist working day since the system’s inauguration on Saturday. After a first day full of delays, overcrowding and rioting, Transport Minister Sergio Espejo announced that five private transport companies will face fines for failing to comply with new regulations.
Many Santiaguinos arrived late to work on Monday, citing transport problems as the reason for their tardiness. Journey times were extended by a third on average.
The government of Chile warned that Santiago companies would face fines if they fired workers for tardiness Monday, and urged anyone dismissed because of Transantiago problems to contact authorities.
Transport problems were most severe around the Escuela Militar area, where a crowd of 1,000 people gathered at 7.30 a.m., stranded by the infrequency of buses. After waits of over an hour, many took to the street, trying to stop buses that were passing by, and police were forced to intervene.
On Monday evening, several buses were hijacked and drivers were forced to change their route. Two buses heading to Pudahuel and Maipú had to divert to Quilicura, as angry passengers complained that there were no longer any buses heading in that direction.
The government said Monday that private companies were largely to blame for the system’s overcrowding, as they had failed to produce the fleet that was necessary to cope with the number of passengers at peak times. Transport Minister Sergio Espejo said that he did not rule out adding more buses to the fleet.
“Public transport is here to serve the people, not the other way around,” said Espejo. “If we need more buses, then we will have more.”
It was also revealed Monday that five of the system’s private operators will face fines for the “sub-par” service that was offered over the first weekend of the Transantiago plan. The exact amount of the fines is as yet unknown.
For right-wing Independent Democratic Union Party (UDI) secretary-general Darío Paya, the Transport Ministry’s announcements were not enough. Paya called for the city’s old yellow micro-buses to be added to the Transantiago fleet to avoid a collapse of the system.
“We can’t have people herded together like cattle in the streets,” said Paya, who went on to refer to the system as “an intelligible soup of irresponsibility.”
After a weekend of free rides for passengers, it was hoped that the bus payment system would return to normal on Tuesday. However, at the last minute it was announced that buses would be free once again, as 15 percent of the “Bip” card machines were not working.
Not all was bad news for the Transantiago’s first few days. It emerged on Tuesday that the Metro was running smoothly, despite a 43 percent increase in passengers.
“We’re very pleased,” said Metro president Blas Tomic. “We’ve had no setbacks at all, apart from a few minor problems.”
SOURCES: EL MERCURIO, LA TERCERA, LA NACIÓN
By Cate Setterfield (editor [at] santiagotimes.cl)
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Protestors Burn—Riders Simmer
(January 25, 2007) Plan Transantiago, the controversial plan to revamp the capital city’s transportation system, is in the spotlight again this week. Last minute changes and growing opposition to the mass transit project foreshadow what many believe will be a rough transition later this summer.
In the early hours of Wednesday morning, two Plan Transantiago protesters in the Raúl del Canto neighborhood in south Santiago set fire to a city bus traveling the 329 Pablo de Rokha-La Pirámide route, completely destroying the vehicle but causing no injuries to passengers or the driver.
Bus driver Eduardo Catrilaf said the vandals boarded the bus and paid as if they were regular passengers before covering their faces with ski masks and forcing the driver out at gunpoint. They proceeded to make the few other passengers on the bus debark as well before dousing the vehicle with a flammable liquid and lighting it on fire.
“They made me stop the motor, telling me that it was a protest against Transantiago,” said Catrilaf. The bus-burning demonstrators are part of a growing group of Santiago residents who strongly oppose the drastic changes to the city’s transportation system set to be in full effect February 2.
The bus owner estimates that the damage caused by the fire will cost him Ch$55 million (almost US$ 102,000).
Now in its initial phases, Plan Transantiago aims to completely overhaul Santiago's traditional mass transit system by efficiently combining bus and metro routes. Among other things, this will mean an eventual phasing out of the city's classic “micros,” as the yellow city buses are known. With an estimated price tag of US$500 million, Plan Transantiago is considered the world's largest and most comprehensive projects of its kind (ST, Jan. 16, 2007).
One of the goals of Plan Transantiago is to relieve traffic congestion during rush hours in the city’s main thoroughfares. With more than 650,000 students making up a large portion of the 1.34 million people traveling during morning rush hours, city officials are looking for ways to spread out the overcrowding on the subways and buses.
Mayors of 12 Santiago boroughs met this week to discuss a possible change to the school starting hour. The proposal was to push back the students’ arrival at school to nine o’clock. However, the final decision was to wait until the school year starts in March to determine where changes need to be made.
“The decision was to see what happens in practice, especially monitoring the last two weeks of March and the beginning of April. If we realize that there is a lot of chaos and we need additional urgent measures, there will be a technical team to make the necessary changes,” said La Florida mayor Pablo Zalaquett, who is in charge of education for the Chilean Municipalities Association. He added, “If there doesn’t seem to be a problem, the mayors will not push for changes.”
Still, letters are being sent to individual schools proposing a voluntary delay to students’ starting hour, even though larger scale changes are still thought to be too drastic for now.
Ordinary Santiago bus riders already have a list of complaints about the Transantiago plan. The new buses provided, though handsome, have many fewer seats than the old micros, and they run much less frequently because while Santiago used to be served, chaotically, by hundreds of different bus companies, it now is served by fifty, whose buses run less often, and will soon be served by ten.
No less distressing to riders, the plan appears to suggest that each bus will run only in one (of a dozen) segments of the city, meaning that if you want to travel to another segment—as most workers do—you will have to take two buses or more. You won’t have to pay for the additional bus trips, but you will have a wait—generally a long wait—for the ongoing buses.
Though the full Transantiago plan hasn’t entered into force, many workers already find that they have to leave 30 minutes earlier than before to get to work on time. As one bus-riding woman told a reporter, “Transantiago is something thought up by government bureaucrats who haven’t traveled in a bus in 20 years because they have a Mercedes to drive.” The consensus of the bus-riding public is that the Transantiago initiative is going to be a disaster. Time will tell.
SOURCE: LA NACION, LA TERCERA
By Laurel Bernstein and Bill Stott (editor [at] santiagotimes.cl)