computerized trains on the lirr

Mark,

Read my post again. You're not hearing what I am saying.

The railroad would put a Transportation Manager on every train in place of the assistant conductor and collectors. He or she would be receive special training and be much better qualified, work cheaper, not make overtime and not be restricted by union agreements. They would take attendance and tell the crew what to do. They could be fired if he slept, was nasty to a passenger or came to work late. The management team could then "jump into action," and immediately correct a crew member who did not do his job.

The railroad would run better and cheaper with management eyes and ears on every train. They would wear a suit, and a vest that said "Passenger Empowerment" or some such thing on it.

As far as opening and closing doors, for another fifty cent an hour the engineer could do that. They even make mirors so he would not have to hang his head out the window.

Don't you get it? They have almost 200 specially trained, college educated Transportation Managers now, up from maybe twenty several years ago. They are hiring another 100 this year. Why do you think they are hiring them, to give out shoe polish in the terminals?

VD Yard, what exactly is the "exclusive work" of a Trainperson contractually, on a train? In other words, for Engineers, I would assume that running and operating trains would be the work of an Engineer and no other craft could do that. I think Clemual said that the LIRR couldn't abolish jobs and let their work be subsumed into another craft. I'm sure Fare Collection must be their work contractually..are door control and such contractually Trainperson's work? In the BLE contract, we are required to make announcements if no one else is available. Wouldn't the LIRR have union problems if they had managers in place of train crew? If the LIRR attempts an automatic fare collection system, would this cause union problems too? Or are you saying that there will be managers on the train in addition to train crew?

VDYard wrote:Mark,

Read my post again. You're not hearing what I am saying.

The railroad would put a Transportation Manager on every train in place of the assistant conductor and collectors. He or she would be receive special training and be much better qualified, work cheaper, not make overtime and not be restricted by union agreements. They would take attendance and tell the crew what to do. They could be fired if he slept, was nasty to a passenger or came to work late. The management team could then "jump into action," and immediately correct a crew member who did not do his job.

The railroad would run better and cheaper with management eyes and ears on every train. They would wear a suit, and a vest that said "Passenger Empowerment" or some such thing on it.

As far as opening and closing doors, for another fifty cent an hour the engineer could do that. They even make mirors so he would not have to hang his head out the window.

Don't you get it? They have almost 200 specially trained, college educated Transportation Managers now, up from maybe twenty several years ago. They are hiring another 100 this year. Why do you think they are hiring them, to give out shoe polish in the terminals?

This is one of the reasons that the passenger fares just went up and are
the highest in the country. Get rid of this waste and the crews will do
their job.
Keep this up and eventually, the LIRR and the rest of the MTA operation
too will have a bunch of college educated Transportation Managers without
actual railroad experience sitting around doing nothing or maybe just
giving out shoe polish as there will not be many trains left running.
Noel Weaver

Liquid,

Unlike the engineers, Train Service employees have no scope rule specifically. There have been Law Board decisions stating that the manual collection of fares is exclusively their work. Machine collection of fares is not. Neither is door operation, inspecting of equipment, communicating with passengers, announcing on trains, etc, etc.

I believe that contractually, the Trainmen would have little to stand on so long as the Carrier did not use management to collect tickets. While the Union can claim anything it wants, recient events appear to indicate that the trainmen's union doesn't want to "rock the boat" about scope issues.

Operationally and legally, engineers are qualified conductors and are the prefered member of the crew to copy train orders, take operating instructions, etc. Operationally, the Railroad would much rather engineers handle train movement matters simply because they are physically operating the equipment.

There have also been a huge number of very high profile incidents of trainmen bailing off trains and otherwise misbehaving. Weekly, spotters are handing management HUNDREDS of reports of trainmen who make no attempt to properly collect fares or who miss trains. The company sees this a a political liability that must be managed and has chosen to investigate several long-term solutions.

Clem

so what exactly do the transportation managers that they already hired currently do everyday?
how much do they make?

In the Transportation Department:

Presently there are two types of Transportation Managers. The experienced ones came through the ranks with at least 15 years of service, have overall supervsiory powers and are the general troubleshooters of the operation on the road. There are less than a dozen of them and they are paid between $75,000 and $90,000. Several are paid 50% to 75% more than that but have specific responsibility for everything on a division or terminal and a wide range of authority and skills. Some are in a union.

Then there is the new group of Transportation Managers, who came through a training program after 1-3 years on the railroad. They are paid $50 - 60,000, and generally stay in public areas and are taught very limited skills. They do clerical work, check that trainmen have dark color socks, give crews safety talks, call passengers who make complaints etc. They refer real problems to the real managers. There are over 100 of these with more being hired quarterly.

Also are perhaps a dozen Road Foremen of Engines, who are the direct supervisors of engineers who themselves were engineers. The dozen or so earn about $70,000 to $85,000.

About 15 Superintendents earn $90,000 - $100,000. These are administrators of an area or a phase of operations, like rules or budgets.

Of course, the traditional skilled managers like yardmasters and station masters are union positions. They are first line supervisors who do the real work and hold the place together. Their jobs are narrowly defined and they earn $75- $150,000 with overtime. There are maybe 35 yardmasters and perhaps 25 stationmasters. These are highly skilled and sought after jobs.

If all this sounds like duplication, check this out: Thirty years ago, there were a handful of Trainmasters and Road Foremen, each with an assigned division and around-the-clock responsibility. There was one Superintendent. The Railroad carried more 30% people, ran more trains, had 40% more employees and a 1000 car/day freight operation.

Do any of the unions have any contract provisions regarding required staffing level on trains? A few years back there was a discussion about this on the Metro-North forum. Train service employees there said that MN often staffed trains with too few personnel, which the crews felt compromised safety. They had been trying for years to get a staffing standard into their contract, but had been unsuccessful. Management insisted on keeping the authority to determine crew sizes.

VD Yard

I did read your post, and while I did mention your name in my post, I apologize if it seemed that i had singled you out. But now this post is directed at you. I strongly disagree with the things that you mentioned above. I'm not sure what your background is, wether you are a RR employee, a rail fan, or a commuter, and where the information came from wether it is based on opinion or info that was in a newspaper or RR magazine, but if you did work for the LIRR, you would then understand why management would be an absolute problem for RR operations. For starters:

The idea of having managers ride on trains and check on crews already exist, what we call crew checking. Crew checking is simply when someone in management randomly selects a train number or job number, and reports to that specific train wherever it is they desire, and walk through the consist getting everyone's Employee number and name. If you are not there, then you get a service run failure and may be sent a trial notice via mail. In addition to that, there are countless numbers of management who commute on the trains daily and who have eyes, and have the ability to report something that may not seem kosher to them. To train crews, unless you recognize their faces, simply have no idea if that person is management, a station cleaner, Track worker, etc.. So the need for more checks is absurd when you factor in that it is already done presently.

The idea of having management run trains or to over-ride Conductor's authority on trains is simply disasterous. There have been countless incidents where management poked their noses where it didn't belong, and have almost caused accidents. One incident in particular occured a few months back when a Long Beach train became disabled after it lost it's contact shoes from a third rail condition. The train was essentially dead in the water. Enter management, with the genius idea of cutting out the trucks of the train in order to release the brakes. I suppose their idea was to have the train free wheel back or ahead so that it may make contact at a location where the third rail would be on the other side of the train. the novelty of this all was that the train STILL HAD PASSENGERS ABOARD! The crew upon realizing their intentions freaked out and contacted someone with a brain in Jamaica and put a stop to the insanity. Of course any trainmen, conductor or engineer could tell you the many ways that train could have been rescued without risking the lives of everyone aboard.

In short, most folks in management may possess a degree in something, but that something is not in railroading, and you can't run a RR like a store, like an airline, or like corporate America. These folks care about one thing, making the trains run on-time, like these folks did. But they didn't stop to think that "Hey, is it legal by the rules to roll this train back without brakes?" "Is there another train behind us that we can smack into" "do we have permission to this from 204 or the Block Operator?" No, of course they didn't think of these things which brings me to the next thing.

All of these managers that you say will be highly trained will possess little knowledge to run trains safely and efficiently. Attending class for say 6 months may allow you to understand the basics, to understand the rules, but as I learned myself, and as the instructors preached back in class, nothing in class will give you the experience that you will gain while working out on the field. What we see in class does absolutely no justice to what we actually see out on the field. When the probelms arise, it is there where we gain our experiences. You think that some hot shot managers who spend a few months in class and more time in the office have any clue as to how to run a RR efficiently and more importantly safely. Not even a long shot! How would this be cheaper for the RR? Managers still get a pension, and while many don't get paid overtime, they sure make larger salaries than what we get, so how would it work? Higly trained?? Do you know what it takes to run a train??? Many of these managers have probably never read a single page in the rule book. Meanwhile, we get recertified every 2 years where we have to be re-tested on our knowledge, spend hours and hours of studying just so that we can keep our jobs, spend countless hours in class, most of it on OUR TIME, non-compensated!! I'm sorry to say, but I don't think that you get. Do you even know all that may stand in the way of these ideas from happening, try FRA rules, try union contracts, ther are so many road blocks, the RR itself would be commiting financial suicide with tax payer money, and I'm sure that that will fly with tax payers and commuters. Another thing, AN ENGINEER IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE SAFE OPERATION OF HIS/ HER TRAIN, not opening doors which can distract him. I have a better question, can you look out the window back at your 12-car train and be sure that someone is not going to be dragged, or killed? As I siad before, if you speak so much of it, come on my train, I will show you everything that I tell you and show you that talk is cheap, especially when you have no knowledge of what goes into running a train. It's not a Lionel Train-set, it's real railroading with thousands of lives at stake, something that many people don't understand. You seem to have the solution to everything in your post, and you probably have as much experience in RRs as much as the NEW managers that are coming into the company. "Jump into Action?" Please, most only jump into action when they see an opportunity to brown nose so that they can move up the ladder. Safety in their "highly trained minds" seems absent when they are hell bent on moving trains on-time.

VD Yard, seriously, you need to get a better look at the real world of railroading and realize that some punk with a master's degree in Business Admin does not turn them into CHOO-CHOO-Charley and Railroad qualified. If you are not out on the field everyday of your career, than you have no say in how things work. It's easy to move trains, it's hard to move them safely with inexperienced individuals. And I will say this again to you and to everyone out there, just because you like trains, or are a rail buff, does not make you into an expert on RRs. Just because you ride the train everday of your life, and figured out what those buzzers mean, does not make you a certified member of the LIRR. It's absolutely ignorant and disrespectfull to all of us who have had to sacrafice our daily lives to bust our rear-ends in studying, test taking, PC drawing, and training to do our jobs. I don't go around to other people and tell them how to do their jobs, or what works better, so please do the same for us. The RR will one day run efficiently when politics are put aside, and management gains an ounce of experience to better understand how the RR really runs on a daily basis. Lastly, I will say that it is not all management that falls under this category. I know quite a few managers who are great people and who I deeply respect. Ironically, these people all have RR experience and have a t one time worked on the trains. Coincidence???

Mark, before you get a stroke, take a deep breath and relax. I'm on the LIRR over 20yrs. It has become apparent that the MTA and LIRR do not regard what it takes to qualify or bear the responsibility we have or anything we hold we hold in high regard as important anymore. Look at the slipshod way they train people and how they have cut funding for training and still complain of those costs. Look at what they put in charge of some of the institutions within the railroad we need and use for our jobs..If they thought anything we do or have to do is omportant, they would spend whatever they can to maintain the once high standards they had and they would pay real salaries to get the most competant people they can to run Departments that we need everyday in our jobs.

From what you have said in the past, it seems you are on the LIRR a couple of years. All I can say to you is that if you were there for a long time, you would see a complete deterioration and acceptance of mediocrity that was unacceptable just 10yrs ago.

Please don't take what I am saying to you as if I disagree with you..It's just that speaking for myself, I would not be suprised if they did just what "VD Yard" was saying...it's obvious that the MTA/LIRR feel that those workers that dare think that they have real time experience and earned knowledge and qualifications..need a manager "managing" everything they do. Managers are everywhere now. Years ago, you would never have seen a manager on that Long Beach breakdown you described..now the policy is send out a manager. Does this sound like a Company that holds it's workers skills dear? The more the MTA takes hold of the LIRR the further away our skills and railroad savvy become important. Decisions like what VD described come from people very disconnected from railroad operations. As time moves on, you have less people within the railroad willing to challenge knucklehead decision makers. And don't think Engineers are immune from any of this. We are held in the same low regard as Trainmen are. If the LIRR could rent Engineers or pick them up at 7-11's every morning they would. The MTA is a rich organization with endless power. If they didn't want Engineers anymore..there won't be Engineers anymore, contracts or no contract.

Head,

The LIRR has no manning rules regarding trains other than the one with the engineers' union that requires an engineer on every train. The Company can run a train with just the engineer if it pleases and has done that. Of course, the conductors' union can make political noise, demand legislation, hold press conferences about safety and cry, but there are no rules regarding their manning other than past practice and what has become rare -- common sense.

Mark is preaching to the bishop in his post. Anyone with road experience would agree with him, but unfortunately neither he nor I make the rules. Liquid is right. The MTA would get their help at 7-11 if they could. In fact, at least one of the new managers came from there.

The wiriting is on the wall here and the MTA will get what it wants. The public and the taxpayer will pay the price in higher taxes and poorer service. Hopefully, not with blood.

C

Speaking of staffing levels, I have a question about something that occured tonight. A Hempstead train pulled into Jamaica with a police assist problem. The conductor had to be removed from the train(not as a criminal). The stationmaster told the engr he was in charge of the train, there was no qualified conductor/collector. Can he refuse to move the train? What if they had to make a reverse move somewhere? Most importantly does the engr get a financial boost for this?

There is no rule or law requiring a conductor, for a reverse move the Engineer could have changed ends.
He does however by law need to do a brake test when changing ends but that could be assisted by trainperson or mechanic..

The Engineer when working as an Engineer and Conductor receives an additional days pay..they would never "refuse to move the train" in that situation because well...they get another days pay...be kinda silly wouldn't it, not to move? It's a BLE contractual agreement..

As far as responsibility goes, they are both already jointly responsible for almost everything on that train anyway..so what's the difference?

As far as braketests "changing ends"..since when do LIRR regs require a re-braketest on the same train if the Engineer changed ends to make a reverse move?

Liquidcamphor wrote:The Engineer when working as an Engineer and Conductor receives an additional days pay..they would never "refuse to move the train" in that situation because well...they get another days pay...be kinda silly wouldn't it, not to move? It's a BLE contractual agreement..

As far as responsibility goes, they are both already jointly responsible for almost everything on that train anyway..so what's the difference?

As far as braketests "changing ends"..since when do LIRR regs require a re-braketest on the same train if the Engineer changed ends to make a reverse move?

Are they not required, as freight engineers are, to complete a brake test everytime they change ends?

So are these managers with 1 year in the training program are going to be on trains? I have one word for that idea....

QUALIFIED... let me spell it out Q U A L I F I E D!