TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Train and engine service workers on the Florida Gulf & Atlantic Railroad have voted to join the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, the BLET announced Friday.
Roughly 75% of employees at the railroad signed authorization cards in April indicating they would like to be represented by the BLET, leading the National Mediation Board to schedule an election. The results of that election were certified on July 12. The union will now begin to negotiate a contract with the previously non-union railroad.
“Railroaders at FG&A wanted union representation so that they can address issues related to safety, working conditions, wages and other compensation with their employer,” BLET Vice President Randy Fannon, who led the organizing effort, said in a press release. “I’ve spoken to the company’s CEO and let him know that we want the FG&A to be successful. With the railroad successful, our members will be successful.”
The Florida Gulf & Atlantic operates 430 miles of former CSX Transportation lines in the Florida panhandle between Pensacola and Baldwin (near Jacksonville), via Tallahassee, with a branch from Tallahassee to Attapulgus, Ga. It is part of Gulf & Atlantic Railways, along with the Granada Railroad and three recently acquired Midwestern railroads, the Camp Chase, Chesapeake & Indiana, and Vermilion Valley [see “Gulf & Atlantic completes acquisition …,” Trains News Wire, May 16, 2023].
FG&A exists solely due CSX routing all Florida trains through Waycross yard. New Orleans to Florida trains now take a circuitous routing through Birmingham to reach Waycross. From Waycross Florida trains either go to Jacksonville or Baldwin and south. By selling to FG&A it allowed downgrading of the trackage while effectively retaining almost all of local traffic and maintaining a detour route if needed. The sell off to FG&A effectively blocks Amtrak Sunset Limited from being extended into Florida.
Mr. Peterson I suspect with the new Meridian Speedway agreement between CSX and CPKC a large portion of the same traffic you mentioned above, that now travels Montgomery-Mobile-New Orleans, will now bypass the Mobile-New Orleans line. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the CSX N.O and M sub downgraded in a few years. CSX has been wanting off the Gulf Coast ever since hurricane Katrina. This would of course negatively affect any presently planned or future Amtrak service along the Gulf Coast.
Sale or long term lease? Regardless, Waycross was, is and will continue to be the nexus for CSX in the southeast of the Southeast. It makes it all the more strange that in the scorched earth policy of the mid-80s the line from Chattahoochee to Climax was removed. For wont of 30-odd miles New Orleans to Waycross traffic either doglegged through Baldwin or now takes the scenic route via Montgomery.
Congratulations Brothers and Sisters.