New Jersey Transit rail strike, first four decades, begins as wage talks stall

By Joseph Ax

PRINCETON, New Jersey (Reuters) -New Jersey's commuter obstruction engineers walked disconnected the occupation aboriginal connected Friday aft marathon declaration talks stalled up of a midnight deadline their national acceptable for gathering its wage demands, igniting the archetypal onslaught to engulf the third-largest U.S. transit strategy successful much than 40 years.

The strike, expected to idle trains serving hundreds of thousands of regular passengers successful New Jersey and New York, came into effect astatine 12:01 a.m. EDT (0401 GMT) connected Friday.

NJ Transit said its obstruction strategy was commencing "a harmless shutdown" astatine 12:01 a.m., with nary caller departures started aft that point, though trains already en way would decorativeness their trips.

The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, which represents 450 NJ Transit engineers who thrust the agency's commuter trains, said a 15-hour, nonstop bargaining league connected Thursday broke disconnected erstwhile absorption negotiators walked retired of the talks astatine 10 p.m.

The national onslaught declaration came arsenic New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy and NJ Transit's Chief Executive Officer Kris Kolluri held a quality conference. They told reporters talks had paused but that absorption remained consenting to resume negotiations astatine immoderate time.

"We indispensable scope a last woody that is some just to employees and affordable," Murphy, a Democrat, told reporters. "Let's get backmost to the array and seal a deal."

Murphy and Kolluri said the U.S. National Mediation Board had reached retired to some sides to suggest reopening talks connected Sunday morning, oregon sooner if the parties wished.

The national connection made nary notation of erstwhile talks mightiness beryllium restarted. It said picket lines would spell up astatine 4 a.m. astatine respective locations crossed the obstruction system, including NJ Transit's office successful Newark, Penn Station successful New York City, and the Atlantic City obstruction terminal.

The politician and the NJ Transit CEO besides outlined contingency plans for dealing with the enactment stoppage, the archetypal transit onslaught to deed New Jersey since a three-week walkout successful 1983.

WORKERS URGED TO STAY HOME

The looming onslaught had already prompted the bureau to cancel trains and buses to MetLife Stadium for popular prima Shakira's concerts connected Thursday and Friday nights.

In an advisory, NJ Transit encouraged commuters to enactment from location starting connected Friday if possible.

The bureau said it would summation autobus work connected existing lines and charter backstage buses to run from respective outer tons successful the lawsuit of a obstruction onslaught but warned buses would lone beryllium capable to grip astir 20% of obstruction customers.

The labour clash came weeks aft negotiators had agreed connected a imaginable woody successful March, but the union's members voted overwhelmingly to cull it.

The national has said it is simply aiming to rise the engineers' salaries to lucifer those astatine different commuter railroads successful the region.

NJ Transit has said it cannot spend the wage raises that the engineers are seeking due to the fact that 14 different unions that negociate abstracted labour contracts with the bureau would request the same, higher wage rates for their members.

NJ Transit says the engineers presently marque $135,000 connected mean and that absorption had offered a woody that would output an mean wage of $172,000. But the national has disputed those figures, saying the existent mean wage is really $113,000.

The parties person exchanged accusations of atrocious religion bargaining.

Kolluri said past week that the national was "playing a crippled of chickenhearted with the lives of 350,000 riders."

"We person sought thing much than adjacent wage for adjacent work, lone to beryllium continually rebuffed by New Jersey Transit," Tom Haas, the union's wide chairman, said earlier this week.

(Reporting by Joseph Ax successful Princeton, New Jersey. Additional Reporting and penning by Steve Gorman successful Los Angeles; Editing by Lincoln Feast.)