Tag: BNSF

Railroad Track Maintenance Workers Reject Proposed National Contract

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October 15, 2022 — Members of the third largest U.S. rail union rejected the tentative agreement (TA) for a new national contract. The Biden administration had brokered the deal in last-minute talks with railroad management and the 12 unions representing railroad (RR) workers. The ranks of the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (BMWED) said “No” by a vote of 6,646 rejecting ratification and 5,100 approving it. The union represents workers who build and maintain tracks, bridges, buildings, and other structures on U.S. railroads.

Are Railroad Workers Heading Toward a Strike?

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August 26, 2022 — Some 100,000 workers on the nation’s freight railroads are one step closer to a decision on whether to go on strike or not. That’s the result of the recommendations made August 16 by Presidential Emergency Board (PEB) Number 250, established by President Joe Biden in June of this year. The government’s intent is to resolve an impasse between the railroad owners and all of the 12 unions representing rail workers organized into the Coordinated Bargaining Coalition and BMWED/SMART MD Coalition (Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees Division and Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers — Mechanical and Engineering Department). The national freight contract expired almost three years ago. The impasse is largely a result of policies imposed by the railroad owners that make working and living conditions for workers increasingly intolerable. This includes imposing draconian attendance policies coupled with the carriers’ demands to cut the workforce even further by altering work rules.

Railroad Workers Keep Up Resistance to BNSF ‘Hi-Viz’ Policy

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March 2, 2022—As locomotive engineer Marilee Taylor explained in the February 11 post on World-Outlook “BNSF Railroad Workers Resist Cruel Attendance Policy,” workers at the largest freight railroad (RR) in the U.S. are under fierce attack by the company owned by billionaire Warren Buffett. Workers who move the freight—engineers, conductors, brakemen and switchmen—frequently face work weeks of 60 hours or more, producing enormous profits for Buffett and the other wealthy RR owners. Many are on call to work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with little or no predictability about when they will be called to work. Shifts are routinely 12 hours and perhaps longer before workers arrive at a destination where they can obtain some rest, often a hotel far from home. Trains are longer and heavier than ever, often carrying hazardous material, as the RRs seek to squeeze the maximum profit out of every trip. This poses serious safety risks for RR workers and the communities these trains pass through. Now Buffett’s BNSF wants more. It has imposed a new policy, called “Hi-Viz,” that demands employees to work even more hours. This cruel and dangerous policy has been upheld by a federal court judge who has ruled that the unions’ challenge to this policy is a “minor dispute,” and has denied the right to strike to oppose it.