The chaos of hundreds of train cancellations that commuters experienced Friday, and throughout the weekend, due to strikes by NJ Transit engineers who operate the trains has now been prohibited by a federal court for at least the next couple of weeks.
With the federal court's order, the trains are back on schedule now, although many bitter feelings were left in the wake of the recent mass cancellations.
On Monday night during a News 12 NJ "Ask the Governor" segment, Gov. Phil Murphy expressed his frustrations.
"What happened last Friday is unacceptable, despicable. And, I'll go out and get a little PG-13, it p----- me off ," he said.
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Murphy is as pro-union as labor forces could hope for -- but the sudden job action in protest over an unsigned contract and not getting Juneteenth holiday pay brought the ire of many down on the engineers.
"I don’t think it’s the right thing to do, especially in today’s work environment when people are going back to work. They shouldn’t be doing this at this point in time," commuter Mahesh Kumar said.
The union rejected straight pay hikes every six months of either 2 or 2-and-a-half percent for the first two years of a 3 year contract. Meanwhile, NJ Transit's 14 other unions have signed on the bottom line.
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For its part, union leadership posted to the web back in March warning members to save for a possible strike, thus maintaining a willingness to fight to the end for a fair and reasonable contract and not what it called the "garbage" the say the agency sold the other unions.
Commuter Sarah Alvarez, from Middletown, said she sympathizes with the union, telling News 4 New York: " If they want better pay. If they want better hours. Whatever they want, I'm with them personally."
When asked if she would be willing to pay more, Alvarez said, "Quite frankly, yeah."
Neither NJ Transit or the union agreed to an interview.
