Transportation News

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New NS board member has familiar name

Former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles has been elected a member of Norfolk Southern’s board of directors. His name is most associated with President Obama’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility, on which he served as co-chair with former [...]

United we bargain, divided we beg

The signs — carried, pasted and nailed about the Wisconsin state capitol building this past weekend — say it all: “United we bargain, divided we beg.” For labor, this may be our finest hour, as working families have gathered peacefully, but strong, con [...]

Rail intermodal eyeing record territory

Railroad intermodal (the movement of trailers and containers aboard flatcars) is poised to enter a “golden age,” reports the Journal of Commerce. The magazine estimates that 2011 could set an intermodal shipment record, eclipsing the record 14.2 million trailers a [...]

N.J. UTU SLD’s father dies

The father of UTU State Legislative Director Dan O’Connell died Feb. 25 in Mt. Laurel, N.J., at age 89. Michael L. “Mickey” O’Connell Jr. was a decorated World War II Navy veteran and a brakeman and conductor with Conrail and two of its predecessors — Pennsy [...]

Preserve democracy in air, rail rep votes

Your help is needed, as will be explained in the following article. Imagine an election for Congress where the number of eligible voters NOT voting is added to the vote total of the candidate receiving the fewest actual votes, thereby making the election’s loser actuall [...]

Local officer on labor radio show

DECATUR, Ill. — Carl Draper, the legislative representative of Local 768 at Decatur, Ill., was a guest on radio station WZUS’ Labor’s Voice radio show Friday, Feb. 25. The show is dedicated to working people and their issues and discusses everything from com [...]

Opinion leaders agree: It’s union busting

Rallies in support of public-employee collective bargaining are being held in scores of cities across America to protest legislative efforts in Indiana, Ohio and Wisconsin to revoke that right. A new attack on public-employee collective bargaining was launched Feb. 23 in Idah [...]

Obama taps BNSF CEO, AFL-CIO president

WASHINGTON — President Obama Feb. 23 named BNSF CEO Matt Rose, AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka and United Food and Commercial Workers’ Secretary-Treasurer Joseph Hansen to the White House Council on Jobs and Competitiveness. The three join a long list of mostly busi [...]

Fighting for collective bargaining in 3 states

A senior Ohio Democrat promises that if Republicans there are successful in passing legislation to revoke collective bargaining rights for public employees, a ballot initiative would be drafted to repeal the law in the next general election, reports the Columbus Dispatch news [...]

Another organizing win for UTU

Employees of Western Rail Road in Braunfels, Texas, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cemex USA, have voted to be represented by the UTU. The railroad moves crushed rock, cement and other aggregates for interchange with Union Pacific at Dittlinger and Stonetown, Texas. UTU Interna [...]