This Week at Amtrak 2005-12-01
Volume 2 Number 39; December 01, 2005
- What a mess Amtrak’s Acting President David Hughes has inherited from his predecessor. As one Washington wag said, it’s as if someone had set up this project to fail, just so they could prove an incorrect point that outside vendors could not easily work with Amtrak employees.The project in question is the Subway restaurant four month long pilot project on New York’s Empire Service trains between Albany and New York City. As reported here last week, Amtrak and Subway entered into an agreement for Subway to operate a food service on the now empty cafe cars of these trains. Amtrak ended its own food service on the Empire Service earlier this year, in an alleged cost cutting move.Well, the pilot project began on schedule on November 17th and lasted … exactly six days until November 23rd. URPA has independently confirmed from non-Amtrak sources that the project was abruptly terminated because of union pressure. Apparently, rightly so.
Subway franchisees began the project, using non-railroad union employees, who worked both in the cafe cars and throughout the trains providing at-seat service for passengers. Cleverly, the unions began an immediate leaflet campaign, passing out flyers to passengers saying that anyone who purchased Subway food and beverages on the train were putting their lives in danger since only Amtrak – and not Subway – employees have anti-terrorist training. A most interesting emotional tactic in a city that will not long forget the horrors of September 11, 2001. Also, on one occasion, a train left without the Subway employees getting onboard.
On the other hand, the union is trying to get away by telling the public the old canard that an American union worker is somehow better than an American non-union worker. According to this logic, two American workers can sit side by side in church and worship together, stand side by side at a polling place and vote together, be side by side neighbors and have their children play together, but they can’t work side by side doing the same job.
One can’t help but wonder if Amtrak staff management, under the direction of the now mercifully recently departed president who was never known to like any unions, set this project up to fail.
New York state is one of the most militant union venues in the country. Why would any reasonable person even consider conducting this experiment without first partnering with the unions on this project? And, why did anyone even consider subjecting Subway employees to what could become a dangerous work environment by the possible actions of some renegade union members that may have wanted to take matters in their own hands?
- Attacking unions is an old and tired tactic by management of companies that are failing. It’s never the fault of bad managers, it’s always the fault of overpaid and under worked union employees causing the company to fail, according to this ill-bred philosophy. The last three former presidents of Amtrak, collectively known as the Transit Trio of Tom Downs, George Warrington, and David Gunn, all led a failed enterprise that heavily depended on free federal monies in the form of annual subsidies to make up for their failings. To help disguise their failings, they also blamed out of date union work rules and other issues related to union labor.Union contracts with successful companies are living, breathing documents that are subject to change as company circumstances change. Often, new technology or new types of competition may cause the elimination of some jobs. But, successful companies grow, and growth usually includes the hiring of new employees, which means more union employees in unionized environments.The bankrupt legacy airlines, and what appears to be soon-to-be bankrupt U.S. automakers are all union organizations. When the good times were flowing, they made promises to the unions that anticipated never having a financial downturn. Those promises today are hurting the businesses, and the changes wrought are hurting union members, too. This is a combined problem of unions overreaching and not looking to the possibility of future problems, to management agreeing to terms that could not possibly be honored in the future in bleak times. Bad moves on the part of both parties that now are hurting the union members and the companies, too.
Even non-union companies make bad management decisions. A highly successful grocery store chain here in Florida, with stores in several other Southeastern states, is employee-owned. No one can buy the company’s stock except employees and retirees of the company. Currently the stock price is flying high. Many of the employees have huge amounts of money squirreled away in the stock, which is often redeemed when they retire or leave the company. But, in a planned move early in 2006, front line managers will be held accountable for their performance by their standard of pay. Managers who fail to meet new criteria will have their base pay permanently LOWERED. This is not a bonus program, but a base pay program. It’s difficult to imagine anything more demoralizing than for a long time employee who has worked often for decades to find their base pay lowered because of some arbitrary criteria that wasn’t in place a year ago. It’s a good guess that productivity and customer service is going to take a nose dive before the end of 2006.
What does this have to do with Amtrak? Some Amtrak union employees have been working without a renewed union contract for six years now. That means no raises, and no change in benefits. That also means that Amtrak has not been able to make any reasonable changes that may need to be made in union work rules through a natural process of change over time. It’s a losing situation for everyone. Let us not forget that these same union employees who have been working without a contract for six years have the right to move to another job at another company at their leisure. However, there is something to be said for job and company loyalty, and a desire to stay with one company for a long period of time instead of the job hopping atmosphere that has become prevalent in our changing society.
Amtrak needs to stop blaming the unions for the results of bad management decisions. Amtrak unions need to seek a better partnership with Amtrak management to resolve whatever issues there are to obtaining new contracts. Both sides need to realize they need each other for now and into the future. Good faith is required of all parties.
There does not need to be any more silly experiments like the Subway experiment. Subway is too good of a company to be yet another victim of Amtrak, just as Bombardier was a victim of Amtrak with the Wondertrain Acela contracts (For this writer, a nice, warm Subway foot long roast beef and provolone sandwich on Italian bread with just the lightest whisper of mustard is always a treat, along with warm chocolate chip cookies, just out of the Subway warming oven.).
And, don’t forget one important element in all of this – the innocent Amtrak passenger. It always seems that Amtrak passengers are victimized by almost everything that happens at the company. Currently, hungry and thirsty passengers have no food service on the Empire Service trains. On other trains that have scaled back onboard crews, passengers are having to endure much less service, cleanliness, and availability of safety employees in an emergency. At stations, baggage service has been disappearing faster than pumpkin pie after Thanksgiving dinner. Electronic Julie has replaced real customer service agents when calling Amtrak telephone reservations centers. Somewhere, somebody has got to take a stand on behalf of the passengers and public. Someone has got to set minimum service standards, and stick to them. Someone has got to be a good president of Amtrak that will be willing to think of passengers and growth first, and worry about infrastructure in its proper place.
Recently, the chief financial officer of bankrupt Delta Air Lines made a startling announcement. He said that the company was (gasp!) going to focus on growth for the company instead of just cost containment. He said that his fellow rocket scientist managers had figured out that a well run company can better grow its way out of problems by offering a desirable product to the public at a fair value price than constantly cutting everywhere. What a concept. Amtrak, are you listening?
- From the Wondertrain Acela file, these two items came floating in over the transom. The first item came from a knowledgeable source about the Northeast Corridor:
“Remember back when Amtrak reintroduced Acela Express service, after the cracked-brake-rotor fiasco sidelined the entire fleet? Many schedules were lengthened to improve Acela’s On Time Performance. Amtrak’s goal for Acela endpoint on-time performance is 94%; up to September 1st, its actual performance was only 75.0%.
“The slowdown through lengthened schedules had a positive effect on that statistic. From September 1st to September 30th, Acela’s OTP jumped to 89.3%. It was better than all but four other trains on the Amtrak system; the long-distance City of New Orleans came in first, and Acela’s older, slower cousin Metroliner came in second, both at better than 90%.
“But things got slower in the intervening two months. From November 1st to November 30th, Acela arrived at its endpoints only 75.1% of the time, virtually back down to its earlier lackluster performance.
“As a result, the Division Superintendent at Philadelphia issued orders for Road Foremen to ride on the head end of Acela Express. A schedule is being put together to try and blanket the Acela services with the foremen. He is assigning managers to watch trains at stations and document dwell times; then compare the ones observed with what is being reported by the Conductors on delay reports. Managers with radar guns (‘Weed Weasels’) will also be checking actual running speeds along the route.
“Similar measures may be taken on the other divisions where the Acelas operate. It’s going to get hot out there, for December!”
And, the second item came from an interested TWA reader who travels around the country constantly:
“I was at a meeting yesterday and today in Boston at an office that is two blocks from South Station.
“Two people at the meeting came from New York, one on Long Island, one from suburban New Jersey. Both flew to Boston.
“The fellow from Long Island flew on a non-stop Jet Blue flight from JFK, for exactly $100 round trip. His comment: ‘Between gas and tolls, I can’t drive here for that. Acela is too expensive, and takes too long – I’d have to drive or take the Long Island Rail Road in to the city, a 45 minute trip, just to get on it.’
“The other fellow flew from Newark, for under $200 round trip, and said he never even thought about Amtrak because ‘It’s always late.’”
(Sigh) There are so many battles to be fought on so many fronts. This sounds like a good public relations campaign needs to be the first step.
- “Follow the money” is the mantra of many when trying to get to the bottom of things. That applies to Amtrak, too. Watch this space for a money trail, coming soon.
