Some 350,000 New Jersey travelers Soon they could be fighting for other ways of working if contractual disagreements are not resolved between the transit of New Jersey and its engineers union, according to traffic officials.
The Brotherhood of Engineers of Locomotoras and Trainmen (Blet) has threatened to attack as early as Friday, May 16 unless NJ Transit and the union can agree on new terms and conditions of the contract for workers who conduct trains. If an agreement is not reached, all Transit Transit Transit, and the MTA Metro-North West of Hudson Service – It will stop running.
“We have not sought anything more than the same salary for the same work, only to be continuously rejected by the Transit of New Jersey,” said Blet President Tom Haas, during a press conference on May 9. “New Jersey traffic engineers want to keep trains in motion, but the simple fact is that trains do not work without engineers.”
A person addresses a New Jersey tranistic train at the Hoboken Transit Terminal on September 1, 2023, in Hoboken, New Jersey.
Gary Hershorn/ABC News
Blet’s national president Mark Wallace said during the press conference that five years have passed since trains engineers who work for NJ Transit have received a salary increase. He also said that many engineers could look for work at Amtrak or the Long Island railroad if their contract requirements are not met.
“Reasonable people would vote for an agreement that is fair,” Wallace said.
Haas said during the press conference that engineers who work for NJ Transit earn an average salary of $ 113,000 per year. If the New Jersey Transit CEO, Kris Kolluri, accepts an average salary of $ 170,000 a year for engineers, then “we have an agreement,” said Haas.
“NJ traffic locomotive engineers already have average total earnings of $ 135,000 annually, with the highest winners exceeding $ 200,000,” according to a statement on the New Jersey transit website with respect to negotiations with the Blet.
During a separate press conference the same day, Koluri responded to the union’s arguments, saying that Haas previously agreed to a salary increase to $ 49.82 per hour, but then demanded even higher wages because he thought there was “a better pot at the end of the rainbow.”
“I cannot continue to give money to the left and the right to solve a problem. Everything is reduced to, who will pay for this? The money does not grow in the trees,” Kolluri said.
ABC news applications sent to NJ Transit and the Slet to comment on the statements of Wallace, Haas and Koluri that contain claims of salary increase did not receive an answer.
The president of Metro-North, Justin Vonashek, announces traffic options for Port Jervis Line and Pascack Valley Line customers if there is a NJ traffic strike next week, on May 8, 2025, in Tarrytown, New York.
Tania Savayan/Westchester County News Journal through USA Network through Imagn Images
The representatives of New Jersey Transit and Blet met Monday with the National Mediation Board in Washington, DC to continue negotiations.
“We want to thank the National Mediation Board (NMB) for calling today’s meeting,” NJ Transit said in a statement on your website after the meeting. “We find that the discussion is constructive and we hope that the negotiations in good faith continue. To respect the collective bargaining process, we will not share any additional details publicly at this time.”
There was no public statement after the meeting of the National Mediation Board, or Blet immediately responded to a request for ABC News comments.
NJ Transit establishes that if they accept Blet’s terms, it would cost them both and the taxpayers of New Jersey $ 1,363 billion between July 2025 and June 2030. In addition, if Blet chooses to attack, the cost of taxpayers to provide a limited alternative service through buses would be $ 4 million per day, NJ transit claims.
NJ Transit travelers were already affected with an increase in the rate of 15% on July 1, 2024, with an additional 3% increase in 3% of the rate scheduled to enter into force on July 1 of this year and every later year. NJ transit saying That the increase was necessary to cover a budget deficit caused partly by a decrease in the era of pandemic in passengers, as well as other major costs, including inflation.
If the strike begins on May 16, nj transit saying “He strongly encourages all those who can work from home to do so and limit trips in the NJ traffic system only for essential purposes.”
NJ Transit officials also said they have developed a contingency plan This includes adding “a very limited capacity to existing New York bus routes in the vicinity of railway stations and hiring with private carriers to operate the bus service” for travelers who generally depend on trains.
However, even with the expanded bus service, NJ Transit said that “it estimates that it can only transport approximately 20% of current railway clients” because the bus system does not have the ability to replace the travelers rail service.
Xuan Sharon Di, associate professor of Civil Engineering and Engineering mechanics at Columbia University, told ABC News that the possible NJ Transit strike would be a “disaster” for traffic in Manhattan due to the increase in bus and car traffic to the city of travelers who cannot take the train. There will also be the additional penalty of travelers to Manhattan having to pay recently congestion price.
“New Jersey traffic is the backbone so that people living in New Jersey move. This is really shocking to me,” Di told ABC News about the perspective of a strike.
Steven Chien, professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, said that many of his colleagues use NJ Transit to travel and that a strike “will paralyze the vital arteries of transport in our regions.”
