VIA headed for strike

[jiml]

Unifor, the union representing many VIA workers, has issued notice of a strike starting at midnight Sunday into Monday. According to the union on last night's news, issues are job security and management asking for concessions, although the latter seems odd when employees are hard to find and difficult to retain. VIA declined comment for the newscast, although in fairness half the country was without communication technology yesterday due to a massive outage. Apparently talks are continuing.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/can...ur-strike-notice-from-unifor-risk-of-service/

 

[thully]

Yikes. Does this impact all VIA trains or just certain ones? I saw somewhere a few weeks ago (when I was on my VIA corridor trip) that there was a labor dispute that could result in a strike, but luckily it didn’t impact my trip. Could be a lot of cancelled trips and people scrambling for flights, what few intercity buses still exist in Canada, and/or rental cars…. Would really stink if you were planning to take the Canadian…

Speaking of which, what would happen with trains running overnight if this strike took effect? Would they continue to their endpoints, or dump everybody off at some random stop?

 

[Bob Dylan]

Unifor, the union representing many VIA workers, has issued notice of a strike starting at midnight Sunday into Monday. According to the union on last night's news, issues are job security and management asking for concessions, although the latter seems odd when employees are hard to find and difficult to retain. VIA declined comment for the newscast, although in fairness half the country was without communication technology yesterday due to a massive outage. Apparently talks are continuing.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/can...ur-strike-notice-from-unifor-risk-of-service/

Would this be a Gemeral Strike that was honored by other Unions such as Public Transportation and other Unions?

I know Vancouver used to Shutdown when Strikes would occur including all Governmemt Workers.( my Late Wife included/ we would head for the San Juans when I this happened!)

 

[thully]

Strike deadline was extended to 4pm, but no deal yet. Wondering what will happen with all the trains running at that time - not seeing any information in that regard. Figure the westbound Maple Leaf would probably terminate in Niagara Falls, NY as it effectively becomes a new VIA train at the border - would be a mess for the passengers if they don’t arrange buses, though at least the trainset wouldn’t be stranded in Canada with Amtrak unable to run it in NY state…

 

[jiml]

Now 8 pm Eastern.

 

[jiml]

The latest from VIA:

This is an important message from VIA Rail Canada.
​

Please be advised that the union representing some 2,400 VIA Rail employees issued a strike notice to take effect on July 11, 2022, at 8 p.m. (ET) should no agreement be reached.

If the union launches strike action, VIA Rail will be forced to suspend all services across the country for the safety of its passengers.

VIA Rail is working as hard as possible to reach an agreement before the strike deadline imposed on us by the union. If the train is cancelled, your ticket will be refunded as soon as possible after the scheduled departure.

VIA Rail will keep passengers informed of any potential disruption in service.

For more information, call 1 888 VIA-RAIL (1 888 842-7245), or our TTY service (for persons who are deaf or hard of hearing) 1 800 268-9503.

We thank you for your understanding and sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this situation may cause.

 

[McIntyre2K7]

So how is this going to work with tonight's Maple Leaf after it arrives in Toronto? Will that trainset just sit in Toronto until the strike is over?

 

[thully]

So how is this going to work with tonight's Maple Leaf after it arrives in Toronto? Will that trainset just sit in Toronto until the strike is over?

I was wondering the same thing. If the strike begun at 4pm they could have terminated in Niagara Falls and kept the trainset in the US to operate the US segment until the strike ended, but that won’t happen now. Could they pay a CN crew to bring the train to the US?

 

[jiml]

Deadline extended to midnight.

 

[jiml]

Could they pay a CN crew to bring the train to the US?

That was my first thought. It would be a standard freight move without passengers. Given the current state of airline travel right now, it wouldn't be a surprise if the government orders them back to work and appoints an arbitrator within 48 hours.

 

[zephyr17]

I'll take the repeated extensions as a positive sign, they're continuing to talk and probably are close enough that both sides recognize they could get there.

Meanwhile, 2 appears to still be sitting at Vancouver, not departed, but not cancelled.

 

[zephyr17]

Strike averted:
https://media.viarail.ca/en/press-releases/2022/strike-averted-rail-reaches-tentative-agreements

 

[jiml]

It was reassuring that the morning train that serves as my alarm clock went through close to on-time today. This was a dispute where both sides had more to lose than gain.