Strike Over: NJ Transit and their Engineers agree to deal

Putting a bow on these past three Pags' Perspective's, NJ Transit and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen have agreed to a new deal, ending NJT's first strike since 1983. My reaction on tonight's episode.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Pag's perspective with your host Ryan Pagano. So,
as far as the New Jersey Transit strike goes, just
like the Mets hopes of winning the series against the
Yankees yesterday, it is so over New Jersey Transit and
the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen coming to a
tentative agreement to end their strike over the weekend and

(00:23):
resuming New Jersey Transit service to some three hundred and
fifty thousand daily commuters that rely on the railroad to
get around Jersey and into New York City. But an
interesting caveat, even though the agreement taking place this weekend,
New Jersey Transit not running any trains on Monday. Now.
This was because New Jersey officials saying that service would

(00:46):
have to resume on Tuesday. They need time for trains
to be inspected a lot of other infrastructure that needs
to be properly inspected as well before giving the aok
to the trainmen to be able to operate properly. Now,
there really aren't a lot of details about the tentative
agreement between NJAT and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trademen.

(01:07):
They've been very tight lipped about that stuff. The union
in particular really wanting more fair wages that really align
properly with what Long Island Railroad and Metro North engineers
are making, which I've said on the show before, it's
not a completely unreasonable compromise to make, and apparently New
Jersey Transit has agreed. Sources closer to the negotiations than

(01:30):
I am saying that it involved the union making concessions
on work rules and the agency on benefits. Another big
complaint about the strike that the commuters have had, though,
is that for any potential agreement to take place, that
it might involve New Jersey Transit raising their fares, which
that's already been a problem in the past few years.
But what's interesting is that government sources are saying it

(01:51):
would not increase fares for at least the next few years.
So essentially what they're saying it's going to be inevitable,
but at least for the short term, it's not going
to hurt the commuter Swallets might eventually, but you know,
as far as right now goes, people are still going
to be able to get to the Beyonce concert at
MetLife Stadium, just Okay, they're going to be able to
get to Yankees and Mets games. Okay, maybe not the

(02:14):
subway series and made Yankee Stadium, but you know they'll
be able to get to Round two at City Field.
So there you go. A lot of Yanks fans are happy.
A lot of Mets fans not so the case, especially
after reading that Bob Clappish article regarding Wan Sota that
was dropped earlier today. That'll be a separate piece here
on PEG's perspective. But back to the strike. Yanks fans happy,

(02:35):
Mets fans not New Jersey. It's just angry all around
about the transit service on Monday, because yes, even though
in agreement was reached, they still didn't have any train service,
so they had to go to the buses today and
tonight for their commute, the contingency plan remaining in effect
for one last day with increased bus service to New

(02:56):
York routes. And from what I've seen of commuters experiences
with this contingency plan, it just sounds mad disorganized, dude, Like,
for example, Metro Park station in Middlesex County, a big
New Jersey transit and also an Amtrak station for that matter, too.
Commuter is just very confused where no trains were even

(03:18):
on the tracks, which if you haven't really followed the
news properly, or perhaps maybe this was your one time
needing to take New Jersey Transit for something, it's pretty
easy in a miss, so I can understand that from
that angle. So if people were still really confused about
why the heck there was no train service, you could
at least go to some of the satellite parking rides

(03:39):
that the agency is offering, one of the big ones
at the Woodbridge Center mall. But here's the deal. Even
though those shuttles go to the Harrison Path station, they
stop at ten am. So for anybody who's looking to
commute after ten am, well, good luck, cause you're on
your own uber it is, baby, and I doubt a

(03:59):
lot of these employers would even bother to reimburse for
an uber, So yeah, good luck with the extra charges there.
It's certainly not a happy commuting day for the Jersey eights,
but at least they know for certain now there is
nowhere to go but up. And I actually mean that
because normally, when it comes to a lot of these

(04:19):
New Jersey Transit issues that I've been seeing on the
news over the past few years. You could easily say, yeah,
there's nowhere to go but up. But that's only because
the human imagination has its limits. Somehow it'll find a
way to go down and then just stay down forever.
But for once, there is actually a lot of optimism,
and just like Jesus on the Third Day, NJT is

(04:41):
so back