If workers went on strike, many services in Seattle, such as Amtrak, would have been affected.
Amtrak said the negotiations don’t involve the company or its workforce but do affect train travel because the train tracks used by Amtrak in Washington and Oregon are mainly owned by BNSF Railway and Union Pacific. Amtrak’s trains cannot operate without the BNSF and Union Pacific dispatchers.the Empire Builder, which travels to Chicago, and the Coast Starlight, which travels to Los Angeles.
There are 12 unions representing 115,000 railroad workers. Their concerns include unpredictable work schedules and strict attendance policies, which makes it difficult to take any time off. “The conductors and the engineers that actually drive or run these trains are on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year, every year. So, I don’t know anyone who wants to be on call 24/7 for years on end,” said Arthur Wheaton, director of Cornell’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations.
“Ultimately, the consumer ends up bearing the costs of those disruptions. So, we’ll continue to see higher prices, shortages and it could have a huge impact on inflation that’s already been high,” said University of Southern California associate professor of clinical data sciences and operations, Nick Vyas.
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