BART

Today, the hold out union (ATU) votes on their contract...again.

The negotiations have drug out months beyond the expiration of contracts for all of the workers at Bay Area Rapid Transit. The other two unions involved in the contract talks have already voted and approved.

The ATU wasn't quite satisfied and threatened to walk, after the BART board decided to implement some bullshit.


I am sorta torn about the whole thing...

You know, I am a lefty, socialist quack.
So I get the merit and value that a workers union can provide.

Alternately, it's public transit.
BART riders don't all ride for convenience, many have no other option.


The ATU striking would have sunk the Bay area into commuter chaos, with roughly 300,000 folks left to find other ways to get around each day.
Remember, traffic is bad here already. Really bad.
Another 100,000 cars driving around isn't gonna help.

And there are those riders with few alternatives.
The ones who would likely loose theirs jobs, should they not be able to show up.

And so on...


The ATU members number around 900 people related to this contract vote/strike.
They were holding out for a few personal days, some verbiage about OT work rules and loosing three positions through attrition.
Reasonable things to stand up for, sure.


Still a tough fight to pick and win much sympathy from the public.
A strike would have been tantamount to holding the region hostage.

For the past two months, transit agencies, cities, businesses - pretty much everybody has been trying to develop some contingency plan in the face of the possible strike.

The last one crippled the Bay.

Even with the planning, everyone agreed a strike would suck.
There is no solution, no way around it.
It would suck in an epic sit-in-a-car-and-think-about-it-for-three-hours kind of way.


Estimated for the costs of the negotiations soar over the million dollar mark.
Plus the tab for everybody trying to figure out what to do if the shit hit the fan.

And so on...


So, let's hope those 900 people are satisfied today.