It may be part of the intention. I know there is obviously pressure on union leaders to prevent a potential strike at all. It would look worse on Democrats if it were to happen.  The prior agreement that did pass was on a similar timeframe so it's not all smoke and mirrors. The other truth is that once the PEB made a recommendation the railroads (just like before) didn't need to negotiate farther. They expected us to be forced back to work or not even allowed to strike. Republicans already had a bill to stop any potential strike and force the PEB agreement on us. This is at least slightly better though it's not really much of a change when everything is considered. FMLA days would cover this in many situations (assuming getting that approved was easy on the RR). And the cap to HW is largely useless and monetarily the same. It just means if the premium stays at the dollar cap any expenses that go over it afterwards are taken out of backpay in a new contract.

Union leadership could have just not agreed to it. At the same time you could argue if the membership votes no it would be a stronger message to anyone outside the union than just the leaders not bringing it to the membership. Many don't really understand how much the RLA hamstrings the unions. If the railroads aren't negotiating and congress is likely to send you back to work either way is it all Union leadership's fault somehow then? The other option is an '"illegal" strike and that opens of so many cans of worms I understand why they're unwilling to consider it.

Grandfather, Dad, uncle, cousins all in Pennsy/ Penn Central/ Conrail/ Norfolk Southern, CSX and a couple of the smaller Illinois/Minnesota/Dakota lines. 5 retirements. Grandfather was senior union guy at the Altoona Yard for Pennsy. I went career military.

Lose some weight so you can fit in the latrine, I'm sure it is OSHA compliant. Yes, I agree with your point that videos should be deleted after a time period and I would be surprised if they are not.

Or, stop bitching about a camera that could actually keep you guys accountable and provide a safety feature to the railroad. You are being paid. MANY people work under cameras, if you are operating a train you are in a particularly sensitive position. Hell there should be cameras covering every square foot of that cab.

Modern union guys, always finding something to bitch about. Quit if it is that much of a hardship. There are jobs everywhere. I have zero compassion for your bitching.

Strike may be averted but our Vacation by Rail trip[rail portion] on the California Zephyr was cancelled today. Due to depart Chicago this Sunday.

Just seen it.

22% raise

No change in sick policy other than 3 unpaid days, 30 days out and can't be Fri thru Sun.

Heathcare going up $90.11 starting Jan 1st/increase of $21 - Jan 2024/increase of $22 - Jan 2025


I can only laugh and shake my head. No thank you....

Go find another thread to shit in. This one here is not for you.

Sorry to hear that,  no idea why they would do that

"Safety" "Accountability"

This guy should be in TRS. He'd get some e mails out that would get some shit ironed out with those buzzwords.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/20/business/railroad-service-problems/index.html?fbclid=IwAR1uvDLEc3sMilXjkITvd1sTF7UPiV_xs9HeceQX7u3zHVaivxXk-mhzeuQ

Apologies for the shit screenshots, i couldn't cutnpaste.

Some of this may be specific to old SP western lines, I'm  not sure.

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No one I have talked to is remotely satisfied. Hell no one talks about money it’s the horrible schedule and trying to get time off. Should be interesting how things proceed.

The IAM came out with another tentative agreement that is a joke.  I'm not even going to post it. They're all kicking the can down the road and trying to force the contract on everyone by repeatedly offering the same thing with irrelevant changes.  Two of the new items on the machinist agreement state that the carrier will negotiate after ratification.  Lmfao!

Double post...

It’s like the more you read it, the worse it gets.  Automatic bid systems and self protecting pools that the carrier gets to regulate? WTF?!? We have been fighting against that shit for years.

We would be better off we just the PEB.

Those are all from the PEB. The only thing we got past that was the Tue-Thur appointment days (these are from the CSX, apparently how it works there in weekends vs weekdays), and the "capped" HW (this is meaningless and monetarily neutral).

But yes, you understand these are all trades we could have made without the PEB. We're bargaining to get part of what we lost back by opening up things we did not have to.  

Both sides of this "negotiation" were basically told to end this now. I've heard enough through the grapevine to not dismiss it as a rumor. The problem is that ending it now is resulting in labor getting the short end of the stick. The railroads ignored the possibility of an actual strike because monetarily it would not hurt them like it would hurt labor and the entire country.

So any naysayers that I disregarded about this being all the democrats forcing the issue as best they can you can rejoice. At the same time Republicans did nothing but attempt to fuck labor's position by forcing us back to work with the PEB recommendation. Each side wanted to either use it as something for leverage, or not be blamed for it.

It's close enough on both the Western Class 1's. Most of these types of agreements came from the CSX and NS. Both were granted concessions when they agreed to them.

Sounds like a giant "Fuck you" to the rail guys.

Saying the NEW mutually agreed to cooling off period is now Dec8-9

Just saw a blurb on BNSF Connect that 2 unions, BRC and TCU, have ratified the agreement.

Maybe that's the idea. Crap proposals so it wears everyone down and "Just go back to the PEB one" becomes the default choice.

Well maybe. I don't know. I could see it though. ClownWorld rulz.

The only safety feature an inward facing camera provides is the safety of the executive bonuses for reducing man hours because they fired someone for trying to do their job under an impossible set of rules and regulations.

The outward facing cameras and the data recorders provide enough information to see if everything is being operated in a safe and effective manner. Inward facing cameras are an executive power trip when every move is already recorded in two or three other manners.

You like cameras so much, why don't you live stream yourself working on YouTube? Oh and don't forget to leave the camera on any time you're in the room. Gotta have that accountability you advocate for, right?

I like the no sleep schedule because your always on call and falling asleep during a 12hr shift is a write up.
They like to use the camera to go after every little rule violation they can. They have rules for sitting wrong. If it looks like you could be slouched and asleep is a write up. The hell they took out the head rests on all the trains because fuck crew comfort.

The best parts are the CBT's we have to do every couple of years that are about getting proper sleep and circadian rhythm's etc... How harmful it is slowly killing us, and how lack of sleep affects motor skills and judgement. Then the company responds to every instance of poor lineups and inadequate staffing with "After 10 hours you're rested. It's your responsibility to be ready to work when we call"

Yep which is impossible. I am still debating on if it’s worth the money. I had high hopes for a better contract.

Things would change if they had to pay for keeping you on short call. They would Probably just fire more people though.

Hadn't really felt like bothering to respond to this until now since you're obviously clueless about how they're actually used.

So your answer is "no I haven't worked at a railroad before and I don't know what I'm talking about at all."

@MostlyPeaceful

I fit girth wise just fine. I'm close to 6'2", I don't fit vertically very well at all.  Typically when I go number 2 it's on a second motor that may have either an AC that doesn't work, or wasn't turned on. I don't do it with the door closed for a multitude of reasons you apparently can't understand. There's still a camera that is operating and is randomly audited just like the leading unit.

They are not OSHA compliant because OSHA doesn't have shit to do with operating conditions on railroads. Paper cut in Ft Worth, sure they do. Outside of mostly office environments here they don't.

It is a safety sensitive position. It's also our break room at the same time. We don't have separate facilities to go eat or do whatever you would in any other job you're talking about would. If the railroads treated their responsibility of handling the footage in the same manner it is elsewhere I probably wouldn't be bitching. The footage is eventually deleted AFAIK but it's on the order of 30 to 90 days. Not right afterwards when nothing worthy of reviewing the video has happened.

They don't use it for safety, they use it for rules compliance. They use it to harass employees that they have decided need to be on shorter leashes or are just plain a thorn in their side. The rules on a railroad are written so that on an average day nearly everyone breaks one of them. Not intentionally but because there is no exception for a rational excuse if they're interpreted as black and white.  Phone rules for example. They must be turned off when a train is passing by you. So you've stopped and happen to be at a location that visibility around a curve is nil. You're on the phone with you s/o you haven't actually seen in 3 days because of your schedule. A passing train comes by around the curve and you are in the process of saying goodbye and turning it off and stowing it as it comes by. If you're not on their shit list or someone doesn't feel like following up nothing happens. If not, you're getting an investigation letter. And you're not going to win that fight because you were breaking the actual rule. Same goes with stowing the phone "out of sight". You put it down earlier but the corner of it is visible to the camera because the pouch you put it in wasn't completely closed. Another investigation letter.

These aren't made up hypothetical stories. They've really happened. There's a certain local chairman who was at the STB hearings in April. Who commented against the railroads. He works in the Ft Worth area and has been a railroader for 25 years. He knew he was putting a target on his back and did so anyway. Being from the Ft Worth area he has made many acquaintances and friends who now are management or work at the NOC. He was told by several of those people that they were out for him now. There's a bit more to the story, but he received a picture on his phone with an image from an anonymous number he didn't have saved in his phone. Being a local chairman he receives dozens, if not hundreds of texts a day. He's now under investigation for that picture with the inward facing camera as evidence.

As for quitting being a reasonable response, sure. Would you quit a job if it meant that all the SS taxes you and your employer paid over the years in were now going to be worth 1/3 of what the would have been when you retire if you just continued working there instead? We've had this discussion repeatedly in this thread. For a better answer go read the responses again.

@Thirteener

Yeah bud, every sentence you write is modern union. No sympathy from me. Do you want this to be a thread just for railroad union guys? Then go somewhere else. I'll comment on your inane yappings here in GD.

It’s like listening to CM Johnson or Tillerman pontificate about airplanes and flying.

as if you're a robot with an ON/OFF switch

Rail union rejects labor deal brokered by Biden administration, raising possibility of strike

The fat lady has not yet sung.

This is kicking the can until Christmas. Avoiding a strike until much of the holiday freight has made it onto the shelves and blue balling the labor until a couple of weeks before Christmas so that they’ll agree on a lesser amount for some Christmas shopping money.

I love how the union is just going to punt until after the midterms.  I suspect another three unions will reject the deals.

I’m not sure who is more corrupt - the union leadership or this administration.

Get both

you sir, an an idiot.

Co-rect

What's the latest on this?

Status of SMART/UTU Conductor upcoming vote.  I suspect the BLET Engineer vote is same or near same status.


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Why A National Railroad Strike Is A Possibility Again

SMART-TD (conductors, switchmen and brakemen) and BLET (locomotive engineers) have yet to vote. If yard office talk is any indication, I expect them to vote it down, too.

Concerns about rail strike disruptions ahead of holiday season loom

FWIW my State's Conductor union PAC has endorsed Kari Lake for Az Governer and donated $5200, the max donation possible.

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I hope you guys get the QoL concessions that you're really after.

https://archive.ph/HCDkM

Volume is down and costs are up, pushing ORs near 60 again. UP had a 2022 OR goal of 55.5%. That went out the window after Q1.

Expect all other RRs to struggle with OR for the rest of the year.

Recession here we come.

I like Kari Lake but there’s a lot of hyperbole in that letter. Someone will be along shortly to correct her.

It is very quickly turning into a situation where rail completely prices itself out of the equation (if truck is an alternative).

Only by choice where they decide margins aren't fat enough. The (poor) service they're providing is the only thing that can really do that. Rail is inherently too efficient for medium and long distances for that to happen.

So I will be attending a meeting with Jeremy Ferguson tomorrow. Should be interesting.

A guy I work with that was a hard 'no' spoke on the phone with Pierce for an hour the other day and came back a 'yes'.  Of course he's unable or unwilling to articulate what changed his mind other than "he explained things in more detail".  

FWIW the guy in question is no genius so I don't take his opinion into account on most anything.  And Pierce being a known salesman like all seasoned politicians,  the local fella was told that if he did a 180 on a phone call from Pierce he should be sure to avoid any time share seminars or Cutco knives salesmen...  

IF Pierce and Furguson have a more detailed and informative message they're presenting to locals and via 1 on 1's then they should make a simple fucking video with the same damn information and roll it out to the memberships.   Anything less is negligent.

I suspect this is a "this is the best we can get and it could get worse" scare you to death salesmans tour.

Me,  I'm a hard "no" either way.

Any BLET members be sure to vote for Eddie Hall running against Pierce.  He's super smart and as solid as they come.

I liked his email to the membership back in Sep, asking for support.  He called out Pierce bigly, and rightfully so.  His other emails have been very informative.  He’s got my vote.

Pierce & The BLET Slate is scared of him.