Happening Now

Hotline #714-A

April 1, 1992

President Bush appointed a Presidential Emergency Board yesterday to prevent an Amtrak strike this weekend. The National Mediation Board had announced it could not settle outstanding contract disputes in early March, which started a 30-day clock ticking through April 3. The board has 30 days to recommend settlement terms and then management and labor have 30 more days to accept or reject the terms. Therefore, no strike can happen legally before May 31. If there is a strike, Congress may elect to step in and legislate a settlement, as they did a year ago with the freight railroads. Two other Emergency Boards were appointed yesterday -- one for Conrail and its unions still without contracts, and one for the Machinists union, which was not part of last year's strike. Amtrak has new contracts with 54% of its unionized workforce.

Comments

"The National Association of Railroad Passengers has done yeoman work over the years and in fact if it weren’t for NARP, I'd be surprised if Amtrak were still in possession of as a large a network as they have. So they've done good work, they're very good on the factual case."

Robert Gallamore, Director of Transportation Center at Northwestern University and former Federal Railroad Administration official, Director of Transportation Center at Northwestern University
November 17, 2005, on The Leonard Lopate Show (with guest host Chris Bannon), WNYC New York.