RANTINGS OF A FORMER TRIMET BUS DRIVER

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

TRIMET SCHEDULING CHECK

11:54 AM

The state legislature kicked that idea down the road, to their credit, but don't forget that Mcfarlane was all to happy to see a transit strike at Oregon's largest transit agency. A man who handed himself and his six figure salaried cronies raises in secret while at the same time raising fares, cutting services, and imposing additional costs on union employees.
Always remember what kind of people we have in charge of our transit agency, and that includes the complicit phony Trimet board of sock puppets who put their stamp of approval on Fred Hansen's ridiculous $16k a month pension as well as authorizing all the management malfeasance that has prompted the state legislature to authorize a top to bottom audit off all managements wrongdoings.

This commment at the Oregonian sums up the situation well!

TRIMET WORKERS FACE THE SAME RUTHLESS MGMT AND MEDIA AS BART WORKERS

Antonnette Bryant, President of ATU 1555, says it's difficult to negotiate with people who "deliberately distort the truth."

For perspective on salaries, consider a family of four living in the Bay Area needs roughly $74,341 a year to get by compared to $62,517 in 2008. BART officials have released inflated salary figures of BART train operators and station agents, adding fuel to the greedy workers myth. The officials claim these workers make an average of $71,000 annually when in fact the SF Examiner reports they make a maximum of $62,000 annually.

The typical media consumer would have to do a lot of digging in order to find the union's demands because the media is presenting the story as Greedy Workers Versus Hardworking Americans.
Here's just a sample of some headlines:
"BART strike has transit, commuters scrambling," "BART Strike Hits Commuters; No Word On Service Resumption," "BART strike: Commuters find creative ways to get to work," "BART strike: What are my commute options?"
In all of these instances, the striking workers are presented as a nefarious force fixated on disrupting other workers' commute for…some reason. Probably greedy motives. Usually, these kinds of articles open with a profile of some poor unsuspecting sucker who can't figure out how they're going to get to and from work because of the evil BART employees.
Here's the LA Times showing how it's done:

Wayne Phillips did everything but swim as he struggled to get to his tech job in this city's Financial District on Monday morning.
His usual smooth ride on a Bay Area Rapid Transit train was derailed by the system's first strike in 16 years. So Phillips drove from the East Bay city of Concord to Oakland. He stood in a "quarter-mile-long" line for a ferry. Then he gave up and jumped on his own boat, a 30-foot Bayliner named Lovin' Life.

Oh no! Poor Wayne! The reader is left feeling angry at those terrible BART workers who are on strike for…some reason. Probably for more gold chalices.

Read more: BART Strike: Another Instance of Media Portraying Workers as Greedy | The Nation http://www.thenation.com/blog/175063/bart-strike-another-instance-media-portraying-workers-greedy#ixzz2Xu3mdgJM
Follow us: @thenation on Twitter | TheNationMagazine on Facebook

Another day on the MAX

FAT CAT TRANSIT EXECUTIVES

Whining about unions while they get fatter and fatter on the tax payers dime:

William "Bill" Volk, the longtime managing director of the Champaign-Urbana Mass Transit District, is scheduled to retire on June 30, 2014, but he won't be walking out the door empty-handed.
In his 40-1/2 years with the district, Volk has managed to stuff his personal bus with a pension that will pay him roughly $210,000 a year, or $17,500 per month.

Fred Hansen's pension was $16,000/mo after just 10 years

Jim Dey: MTD director's big raises sweeten his pension | News-Gazette.com

Monday, July 1, 2013

VERDICT ON TICKET PRINTERS-SUCCESS!

A very reliable source has informed me that all the fears about the ticket printers did not happen. So I guess we can chalk one up to Trimet that the whole thing did not end in complete disaster on day 1.

Credit where credit is due. It still is a stop gap to a truly modern fare collection system which Trimet is years behind other transit districts

WHO HAS THE RICHEST BENEFITS? TRIMET OR BART?

MAX REDLINE'S VERY ENTERTAINING TAKE ON THE CRC

Perhaps Porkland and TriMet can now be persuaded to abandon their long-cherished dream of ramming light rail down the throats of unwilling Clark County residents. Likely not, but they've certainly cost taxpayers a lot of money in this demonstration of arrogance.
That alone is reason enough for the CRC group to be disbanded, and if a new bridge is to be built at some point it might be a good idea for the states to hire engineers who actually know what they're doing.

MaxRedline: CRC: Finally Cooked.

9:44 PM, HOW'S TRIMET DOING ?

Looks worse now than it did at rush hour

This was written by a current operator, the author is correct. I was totally convinced when I left Trimet that there is psychological torture used against operators and the 'fear' of losing your job is real.

1.       Roll back all schedules to about 1 hour (and some change), with
           exceptions of the 4, 12, 72, 57.
2.       Roll back all major breaks, to recovery time.
3.       Front load, the major breaks and add only recovery time in the latter
            part of the work day.
4.       Make the schedules, so that the operator is driving longer with only
            recovery time in-between.
5.       Make the scheduled splits lengthy, so that the operator has no time for
            union activities.
6.       Put pressure on the new operators to keep the schedules, with fear of
            losing their jobs.
7.       Make Dispatch the front line extension of management, with the charge
            of keeping the buses moving, no matter what, short of bus breakdowns.
8.       Annually monitor operator’s work, by compiling a years’ worth of
            statistics. Meet with the operators, and pressure them to keep and maintain the
            schedules. Using intimidation and fear.
9.       Deny any changes to the schedules, via yellow card.
10.   The treat of time loss, if an operator is sick, injured or assaulted
        (physically or mentally).
11.   Keep information of changes to the SOPs from the union, and implement them
        as needed.

Incident that won't make trimet crime stats

IS MAX SAFE?

BLAST FROM THE PAST!

Thanks to an extraordinarily generous vacation policy, a select group of BART's white-collar employees have stockpiled a combined seven decades' worth of unused time off -- literally like money in a bank that can be cashed in for fat retirement windfalls.

The costly perk isn't getting much scrutiny as commuters sweat a potential strike and management and blue-collar unions slug it out at the bargaining table. That's because this little-known benefit isn't available to the vast majority of BART workers who are threatening to cripple the Bay Area's commute over their pay and benefits. It's reserved for BART's top-level employees like former general manager Dorothy Dugger.

BART strike: Commute chaos rages on as strike begins with no end in sight - San Jose Mercury News
Bart Strike Raw Video: See what commuters have to say about transit strike - San Jose Mercury News

IF METRO AND SMART CAN DO IT WHY CAN'T TRIMET DO IT?

@trimet Even SMART transit has 3 bike slots on their new gillig buses. pic.twitter.com/hnIS46MEsP
— PDX Transit Lane (@pdxtransitlane) July 2, 2013

HOW WE ROLL YOU OVER!

@trimetscanner STORMTROOPER ALERT #TriMet pic.twitter.com/LMplM74HKL
— Ron (@TelemachusRome) July 2, 2013

WHY ARE YOU LATE? 5:54 update

Because some Trimet schedules cannot be anywhere near on time? I wonder if MAX operators are told to write a yellow card. Some of these buses are so late its ridiculous

HOW ARE TRIMET SCHEDULES WORKING AT THIS TIME-4:27 update

This will be a regular feature of this blog. Gives us a snapshot of how effective the Trimet scheduling department is.

#TriMet, see where it takes you. pic.twitter.com/gqNiplcr7X
— Ron (@TelemachusRome) July 1, 2013

LAW PROHIBITING TRANSIT WORKER STRIKES DISPUTED IN MISSOURI

While Metro spokeswoman Patti Beck said Metro employees have no right to strike, Breihan said that isn't true. He conceded that in Missouri employees that serve the public can't strike but he expects that if the arbitrator's decision is disputed, lawyers for the union will argue that the local's members are not "public" employees.
This could apply to transit workers in Oregon it seems to me!

Metro strike not starting yet - Mass Transit

INCIDENTS THAT DON'T MAKE CRIME STATISTICS

BART STRIKE VIDEO

TRANSIT STRIKE ANNOUNCED (sounds like Trimet management)

"They Treat Us Like Slaves" BART ATU 1555 & AC ATU 192 Transit Workers Rally In Oakland - YouTube

War Against Transit Workers- Speak Out At AC Transit Bd Of Directors For Worker & Human Rights - YouTube

I AM A ROBOT: ATU 192 AC Bus Driver Rap On What The Management Wants - YouTube Don't miss this one! It's great!

BART Workers Take Strike Vote And Speak Out About Health & Safety And Workers Comp Attacks - YouTube

BART WORKERS STANDING UP TO GREEDY LYING TRANSIT EXECUTIVES

(Trimet richest benefits in the nation? What liars)

Thousands of Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) workers went on strike at 12:01 a.m. Monday following the expiration of their contracts. At the same time, Oakland city workers were holding a one-day strike and contracts for AC Transit bus workers expired.

The BART workers are opposing management demands that they begin paying into their pensions funds, accept increased health care costs, and settle for a 1 percent annual wage increase that will further erode their real wages.
The strike, the first since 1997, promises to have a massive impact on San Francisco, Oakland and other cities and towns in the Bay Area of northern California. There are 380,000 daily riders on the BART system and 240,000 on AC Transit.
The 1997 strike lasted for six days and caused traffic across the Bay Bridge to back up all the way to Livermore, 45 miles away. There is no alternative to BART for the majority of commuters.
According to union officials, the last contract offered on Saturday amounted to a $9,700 reduction in compensation over its four-year duration.
The average station agent or train operator makes just over $60,000 a year. Given the high cost of living in the Bay Area, any drop in compensation would be devastating.

I've been late most runs this week or at least since my safety/recertification class. in class i shared my worry or prediction whichever, that altho' i was in favor of the safety precautions taught in this class, and noted some areas of my driving habits that I could improve on and adapt so i would align with the safety imperatives required, I mentioned that we will be late due to observing safety needs, and would be questioned as to why we are late.
delays will have a decidedly negative impact on current public opinion.

BART UNION WALKS TAKES UP THE CAUSE OF ALL UNION WORKERS

BART issues statement as unions go on strike

Following decisions by its unions to go on strike, BART Spokesperson, Rick Rice, said, “We have a long way to go but we can’t get any closer if we aren’t at the table. We reached tentative agreements on 11 items today and we should use that momentum to reach a deal. Walking away doesn’t do any good.
“The public doesn’t deserve to be punished. We are sorry they have decided to strike despite the fact we are willing to negotiate. The District is prepared to return to talks and get this finished. We would have worked all night long.
“BART has a fair and responsible offer on the table. The proposal provides an 8% wage increase over the 4 years and we lowered our pension and healthcare participation proposal.
“We urge riders to go to BART.gov and 511.org to get the latest information on commute alternatives.”