With the promised end to New York commuters’ Summer of Hell just days away, a transit union is racing to not let a good crisis go to waste.
On Tuesday, the executive board of Metro-North’s largest union, the Association for Commuter Rail Employees, voted 5-0 to ask members to bless a strike — and create yet more commuter hell for the region.
Metro-North’s trains go to Grand Central, not Penn Station, so its nearly 300,000 riders thought they’d escaped Summer of Hell pain. Well, maybe not.
The union, representing engineers, conductors, controllers, signalmen and yard masters, gripes about several issues — including lengthy delays in OK’ing disability pensions and the hiring of locomotive engineers from the outside. Its new contract, which came up for renewal nine months ago, still needs to be ironed out.
Metro-North officials say they’d view a strike as “unlawful,” since federal law allows one only if ACRE’s concerns qualify as “major” issues. The railroad also says it’s “working collaboratively with the union,” expects “all outstanding issues” to be resolved and doesn’t see a strike as “imminent” at all.
No matter: Even if ACRE’s move is just bluster, it’s still outrageous.
“Threatening an unlawful strike is completely irresponsible” and “an insult to hundreds of thousands of Metro-North” riders, says spokesman Aaron Donovan.
He’s right: The region is suffering from enough transit woes. It doesn’t need unions trying to exploit the situation.
In Texas, good Samaritans have helped out during Hurricane Harvey, though looters and price-gougers have also popped up. It’s clear which side the Metro-North union is on in New York’s transit crisis.