Was anyone affected by it?

I thought it was kind of odd that the city held out this long only to fold faster than Superman on laundry day now. It seemed like they might actually play hardball and keep offering less and less each time to send a message to the union that they weren't going to be getting more after that previous "last offer". I consider myself fairly left-wing but it's things like this that give all Unions a horrible reputation it seems.

I was affected - I dont drive to work as parking is 180 per mo. Nuff said.


I agree with the fact that they have a legal right to strike. What gets me is the fact that the starting wage is 50 grand and they are whining. Really, like stfu already and be happy you have a JOB let alone one that pays that well.

Unions are good for a few things like making sure people ( well usually ) are treated fairly so that employers dont get away with being f-tards. But more often than not, unions get greedy as people usually are. As shitty as it was to have the busses off the roads, I hoped the city took a stronger stance as they should when its mostly an issue of greed that the taxpayers like you and me will end up paying. Give it a few more weeks and the workers will whine about needing to pay bills.

If it is a legitimate grievance, then fine work the shit out. But due to the nature of the strike its already been announced that there will be a fee hike. what else is new.


Like it is in many a workplace, the best schedules are given to the most senior of worker. Its a little thing called paying your dues and working your way up. I for one didnt whine when i started at the bottom. I sure as hell wouldnt whine when if I got paid 50K and would also get paid o/t.

Sorry I missed out on all that shizzle...Good thing I'm coming back for a vacation just as they figure their shiat out.

They are already hiking the bridge tolls anyways!

This is what the city was trying to do away with so they wouldn't have to pay so much in overtime wages.

People complain about how much bus drivers make in wages. There's a reason why they make so much. That reason is the fact that we generally make shitty passengers and the horrible drivers who have no business being on the road aren't helping anything.
In 5 years of riding the bus every day I was involved in at least 12 minor accidents, been injured twice, witnessed a driver get punched in the face, listened to countless hours of verbal abuse directed at drivers, and don't even get me started when an already overloaded bus pulls up to a stop that has a "swiss-army" baby carriage waiting. This carriage being the size of 8 people worth of standing room who all now have to get off the bus or the driver has to refuse entry to the mom/kid. Either decision being the wrong one for the driver.

This money serves one purpose, employee retention. They need to pay enough to keep the drivers they have and that amount is determined by how much money it takes for someone to put up with any amount of bullshit and not say anything.

I'll agree that being a bus driver wouldn't exactly be my dream job, but I think when you compare their salaries to other public sector jobs (teachers lets say) they are getting a disproportional amount for the training/skill they have. I think the one thing this strike has shown me is that the bus drivers were already being over paid, and they basically just got more.

Even if they were paid around $45k a year + benefits, with not as many options for milking the O/T system, I'm sure they would have no problems for staffing. It's not like by paying less you won't be able to retain the "better bus drivers" either because it's not like they can take those talents elsewhere. That sounds a little cut-throat I know, but that's the trade-off of having a profession that doesn't require much training - you get what is enough to bring the workers in.

Anyways, just my 2 cents. I'm not one of those "anti-tax" people, but I do want my tax money spent wisely and I hate when it goes to something like this instead of area's where I think as a society we should value more (health, education etc).

agreed to an extent on all point brought up.

Now today I got on the bus as its free until the end of the month AND...

I looked at the bus driver and the dude actually looked scared. It was like he was expecting to get told off any minute.

interesting.

I checked on the news this morning to see if there were any incidents but it doesn't really sound like there were any of mention. If I was a transit user, and even if I disagreed with what was done, I wouldn't have said/done anything anyways because you don't really know the situation of the bus driver so how can you really take out all your frustration on him for what the whole union was like.

I did find it funny last night though with how many "Support our bus drivers" and "Don't be mad at the bus drivers" like messages and articles were posted around. I could tell one of my co-workers must know a bus driver because she was posting a lot of them on Facebook last night so I figured they were pretty nervous about today.

I can rant all day long about the deal they got. Its truly f*d how council handled that.

THEY GOT A $4000 Bonus immediately after the strike WTF!

They bent on everything and gave them everything they wanted. plus a bonus. W-T-F

A tad worried me thinks

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scot ... lifax.html