Transportation News

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SSA, RRB benefits to rise by only 1.5 percent

WASHINGTON – Social Security benefits for nearly 58 million people will increase by 1.5 percent next year, the government announced Wednesday. The increase is among the smallest since automatic adjustments were adopted in 1975. It is small because consumer prices haven’ [...]

Boardman to Senate: Invest in NEC

The Northeast Corridor is a national transportation asset and Congress should stop taking it for granted, Amtrak President and Chief Executive Officer Joe Boardman told a Senate committee yesterday. The corridor is aging, failure prone and lacks redundant systems to keep it o [...]

Unions push for bus driver, train crew rules

Transportation unions want new regulations for train crews and bus drivers.  The Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO Oct. 29 endorsed potential federal mandates to require at least two crew members on all U.S. freight trains, protect bus drivers from physical assaults a [...]

First Student loses arbitration, ordered to pay lost wages

First Student Bus Company/William Penn School District in Darby, Pennsylvania went to arbitration against the SMART Transportation Division and lost. Representing SMART TD was Bus Department Alternate Vice President Calvin Studivant who went to bat for local 172. Studivant di [...]

Americans Love Amtrak

The following op-ed appeared in the Des Moines Register and was co-authored by SMART Transportation President John Previsich and Edward Wytkind, President of the Transportation Trades Department. “While politicians can’t agree on much, Iowans and the majority of America [...]

Hersman, Hart retain NTSB seats

On Monday, Deborah Hersman was sworn in to serve a third two-year term as chairwoman of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). Chair since 2009, Hersman was nominated for a third term by President Barack Obama on Aug. 1 and the nomination was confirmed by the Senate [...]

Pueblo steaming toward Amtrak stop

Support for saving Amtrak’s Southwest Chief passenger train and making Pueblo a route stop is picking up steam. The Pueblo Area Council of Governments passed a resolution Thursday pushing the importance and need for Pueblo to be added on to the Southeastern Colorado route, an [...]

SMART TD travel agency has two trips on horizon

Landfall Travel, the official travel agency of the UTU Alumni Association, is offering two trips to Transportation Division members and retirees in the coming year. The first offering is an Alaskan cruise aboard the Golden Princess. This eight-day cruise leaves from Seattle, [...]

Man assaults women, conductor near train station

OAKLAND — A man who randomly walked up to two women and punched them in the face, punched a train conductor, then pulled a knife on a witness who tried to help, was arrested Thursday afternoon near the Amtrak station at Jack London Square, police said. The 40-year-old m [...]

SEPTA rail members ratify agreement

SMART Transportation Division Local 61 members working at Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority recently ratified a new agreement governing the rates of pay and working conditions of conductors and assistant conductors on the regional commuter railroad. With near [...]