TTD in the news

In the wake of the pandemic and its devastating impacts on public transportation both on ridership and revenue, transit systems across the country are facing a funding crisis that could have decades-long impacts on workers and the riders who are dependent on public transportation. While ridership has steadily improved since 2020, budget shortfalls coupled with other factors, including inflation and rising transit operating costs, threaten to exacerbate what is referred to in the industry as the “transit death spiral”: transit agencies cut service or increase fares and in turn fewer people use public transport, leading to even greater declines in revenue.

In the short term, this feedback loop of declining service will have disproportionate impacts on those who rely the most on transit to get to work, medical appointments, the supermarket, and other important needs. In the long term, it will devastate recovery forecasts for public transit while worsening street traffic, air quality, and our overall economy.

Nearly 9,000 people joined us in telling the FHWA to discontinue the agency’s general waiver of Buy America for manufactured products, which dates back to 1983.

The Alliance for American Manufacturing on Monday officially delivered comments to the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) on the general waiver of Buy America for manufactured products, urging the agency to discontinue this overly broad waiver that has long “denied opportunities to expand domestic supply chains and have discouraged investments in U.S. production.”

Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO President Greg Regan joined the America’s Work Force Union Podcast to discuss the TTD’s recent Executive Committee Meeting. Regan also discussed the growing concerns surrounding rail safety and the Rail Safety Bill that could improve rail safety if passed.

The Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO recently met with leaders of their 37 member unions at the Annual Spring Executive Meeting. The Spring Executive Meeting is a time for all the member unions to get together and discuss policy agenda for the next six months. During these meetings many unions find common points in the difficulties they are having and work together in innovative ways to resolve the issues. One priority for the group leaving the meeting was improving railway safety.

Rail union representatives are poised to adopt a policy statement that urges Congress to pass a rail safety bill — one that mandates a minimum of two-person crew sizes on all passenger and freight trains, regulates train lengths exceeding 7,500 feet and ensures adequate inspections of rail cars, locomotives and brakes.

The latest policy statement of the Transportation Trades Department (TTD) of the AFL-CIO cites at least 18 areas where regulations and guidance via the Federal Railroad Administration can bolster existing rail safety practices. TTD expects to formally adopt the statement at its spring summit on Wednesday, when 37 unions, including all U.S. rail labor unions, are convening at AFL-CIO headquarters in Washington.

Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO, President Greg Regan joined the America’s Work Force Union Podcast and spoke about the current battle between the TTD and railroad carriers, as the unions demand a stop to stock buybacks until improved safety measures are in place.

Recently, the TTD began a campaign that demands railroad companies not buy back their stock until the industry’s safety improves. Since 2015, the six publicly-traded U.S. freight rail companies spent over $165 billion on stock buybacks. That amount is at least $46 billion more than they invested in safety, as the ratio for derailments to every million miles traveled increased from 1.71 derailments in 2013 to nearly 2 in 2022, he added.

Fourteen unions representing more than 100,000 freight-rail workers have launched a campaign demanding that U.S. freight-rail corporations stop all stock buybacks until rail safety improves.

On the nostockbuybacks.org website, unions ask railroad executives to stop using the precision scheduled railroading business model and decrease the rate of safety accidents across the industry so that workers feel safe.

“Since 2015, the big six publicly traded U.S. freight rail companies spent more than $165 billion in stock buybacks, which is at least $46 billion more than they invested in safety,” the unions claimed in a press release.

Negotiations between U.S. Class I railroads and unions representing operating craft employees, such as locomotive engineers and train conductors, regarding sick leave and scheduling will likely last through summer, according to Jeremy Ferguson, president for the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers – Transportation Division (SMART-TD).

The unions and the railroads have been charged to hash out scheduling issues at the local level or the property level, as opposed to the national level. The Presidential Emergency Board, a three-person committee that had been appointed by President Joe Biden to help the railroads and the unions push through an impasse in national contract negotiations last summer, affirmed this course of action last year.

Rail unions want railroads to take some of the billions they’re using every year to buy back their stock and spend it to improve safety in the wake of several high-profile derailments and hire more workers.

The 12 unions that represent all of the more than 100,000 workers across the industry said Friday that collectively the six biggest freight railroads spent over $165 billion on buybacks — well above the $119 billion they spent on upgrading and maintaining their track and equipment between 2015 and last year. At the same time, their safety record worsened as they cut costs and eliminated nearly one-third of all rail jobs.

“I think it has become increasingly apparent that the priorities of the railroads are out of whack,” said Greg Regan, president of the AFL-CIO’s Transportation Trades Department coalition that includes all the rail unions.

U.S. labor unions called on railroad operators to halt all stock buybacks until they improve safety and abandon their lean operating model, which regulators and shippers say has led to deterioration in the quality of service.

The unions have blamed Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR), a concept that encourages running longer trains on fixed schedule with lesser staffing, for worsening working conditions for employees, while shoring up profit for railroads.

Railroads, however, say PSR helps provide predictable and consistent service to customers.

Amid reported difficulty recruiting employees who can pass drug tests, the American Waterways Operators (AWO) is one of the organizations hoping a new testing method gains approval for transportation workers.

Oral fluid testing was approved as scientifically valid by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Science in 2019 and is under consideration by the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), which issued a proposed rulemaking last year. A final rulemaking, initially expected in December 2022, was never issued.

If approved by the DOT, the Coast Guard would also have to approve the testing for it to be valid on the nation’s waterways.