PARIS — French railway workers went on strike today (Wednesday, July 6), with national rail operator SNCF advising customers not to travel if at all possible.
Reuters reports three of the four main unions at SNCF were taking part in the strike resulting in the cancellation of about a third of all trains. Paris commuter trains were also affected.
The strike is scheduled to last for just one day. Most cross-border operations were continuing at normal or near-normal levels, although trains to Spain and overnight service to Vienna were halted.
Unions are demanding salary increases to address inflation, an increased minimum wage, and higher bonuses.
“Railway workers are accepting a lot of sacrifices. They know, once they’re hired, that they will have to work weekends or at night,” Bruno Poncet of the Sud-Rail union told Reuters. “But the compensation for that is not enough.”
Sacre Bleu!
The French railway workers are on strike, Scandinavian Airlines is now bankrupt because their pilots are on strike, the British Railway unions are on strike …..
Lot’s of fun in European transportation these days …..
North American workers aren’t far behind. Canada just ended one of their strikes, and I thought I read American engineers / trainmen / conductors were considering doing one too. (Can’t find the Newswire article, though)
Sacre bleu, c’est dommage, French rails have a one-day strike, ainsi. Which is the fraction 1/365th of situation normal.
What’s the point of asking the traveling public to rely on public transportation if they can’t rely on it? Lots of people in France have automobiles.
In France driving is not really an alternative. Congested roads, expensive gasoline, expensive tolls and a mximum speed of just 130km/h.
The trains are pretty fast and frequent at least between major cities. Domestic flights are also almost completely gone.