Kathy Beisner and her family used to take vacation
trips in their camper. Though her husband Ron worked long hours for
the Union Pacific railroad, making the run between Omaha and their
hometown of North Platte, Neb., there was always time off to take
the kids camping. No more. Since a 1996 merger with Southern
Pacific (HCN, 11/10/97), the railroad can call her husband at just
about any time with 90 minutes’ notice to get to the train yard.
The company can also send him on the road for over two days after
just eight hours at home.
After a series of
ruined camping trips, says Kathy Beisner, “We sold the camper,
because there’s no reason to have it.”
She’s
fighting back by founding and leading a group called WARR:
Women/Wives Against the Railroad. She acknowledges that the name is
more hostile than the wives, girlfriends and fiancées that it
represents, but it gets attention at a time when the railroad
unions are hobbled by a no-strike contract, and freight delays fill
most of the media’s limited appetite for rail news.
“I look at it as slavery – the railroad thinks
they own these guys,” says Beisner. Now, in addition to North
Platte, railroad towns from Little Rock, Ark., to Yuma, Ariz., to
Rawlins, Wyo., have started chapters.
Since its
June launch, WARR has met with federal officials who offered to
help the group track labor-law violations and with railroad
authorities. The merged company, which kept Union Pacific’s name
and leadership, admits that it’s understaffed and says it plans a
major hiring campaign to take the strain off employees. Meanwhile,
it’s working to standardize scheduling and developing a napping
program for employees in order to increase
safety.
UP’s Ed Trandahl insists that the
railroad is as eager to solve the problem as Beisner and her
allies. “We look forward to the day that they will no longer call
themselves at WARR with the railroad,” he says.
* Gabriel Ross
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Women want the railroad to back off.
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