NEW YORK (AP) – North America’s largest commuter rail system was shut down Saturday after unionized workers in the New York City area went on strike.
The Long Island Rail Road serving the city’s eastern suburbs ceased operations early Saturday morning after five unions representing about half of its workforce walked off the job.
The two sides have been negotiating for months for a new contract, and President Donald Trump’s administration had even lobbied to try and broker a deal. But unions were legally allowed to strike starting at 12:01 a.m. Saturday.
Kevin Sexton of the National Vice President of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainers said no new negotiations are planned.
“We’re a long way off at this point,” Sexton said early Saturday. “We are really sorry to be in this situation.”
Janno Lieber, the chairman of the MTA, said the agency “gave the union everything they said they wanted in terms of wages” and that it was clear to him that the union always intended to walk away.
The walkout, the first for the LIRR since a two-day strike in 1994, promises to cause headaches for some sports fans who plan to see baseball’s cross-rivals the New York Yankees and Mets this weekend or watch the New York Knicks’ NBA playoff game at Madison Square Garden in Manhattan. Both sports facilities have dedicated LIRR stops.
If the shutdown continues beyond the weekend, roughly 250,000 people who take the system to and from work each weekday will be forced to find alternate routes into New York City from its suburbs on Long Island.
For many, this will likely mean navigating the region’s notoriously congested roads.
“People are still going to travel, but if everyone starts driving now, the traffic is only going to get worse,” said Rich Piccola, an accountant who commutes to the city while waiting at Penn Station for a train home Thursday.
Governor Kathy Hochul is urging Long Islanders to work from home if possible. The MTA has said it will offer limited shuttle buses to New York City subway stations, but that contingency plan was not designed to handle all the commuters the system typically carries on a weekday.
And while telecommuting options have greatly expanded during the COVID-19 pandemic, many workers still have to show up in person, said Lisa Daglian, executive director of the MTA’s Standing Citizens Advisory Committee, a commuter advocacy group.
“You work in construction, you work in the healthcare industry, you work in a school or you’re about to graduate, that’s not always possible,” she said of telecommuting. “People need to get where they need to go.”
The most recent contract talks have stalled over worker wages and health care premiums.
The MTA has said the unions’ initial demands would have led to fare increases and affected contract negotiations with other unionized workers.
The unions, which represent locomotive engineers, machinists, signalmen and other train workers, have said larger increases are warranted to help workers keep up with inflation and rising living costs.
Duane O’Connor, who was protesting Saturday morning at Penn Station, said that while he regrets the impact on commuters, the workers are just asking for fair wages.
“I feel terrible. Terrible. This is going to hurt. This is going to hurt the island, this is going to hurt the city & mldr; All we’re asking for is fair wages. Record inflation the last few years. Our contract goes back three years, it doesn’t go forward, so we went through those record inflationary years and they’re trying to undercut us,” he said.
Some riders, while sympathetic to the union’s concerns about affordability, worry they will bear the brunt of the wage increase.
If the unions get the wage increases they’re asking for, “it will come at the expense of our riders who will see next year’s 4% fare increase doubled to 8%,” Gerard Bringmann, president of the LIRR Travelers Council, a rider advocacy group, said in a statement. “Like union workers, we are burdened by the rising cost of living here on Long Island.”
With Hochul, a Democrat, facing re-election later this year, the pressure may be on the MTA to reach a deal to end the shutdown, said William Dwyer, a labor relations expert at Rutgers University in New Jersey, where commuter rail workers staged a three-day strike last year.
“She’s up for re-election and Long Island is a critical vote for her,” he said. “So if there’s a significant rate increase, that doesn’t bode well for him on Election Day.”
By PHILIP MARCELO Associated Press
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