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Amtrak said that effective Dec. 15, it will accept unloaded guns in checked baggage at stations and on trains operating within the United States that offer checked baggage service. 

This change in the Amtrak checked baggage policy is required by the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2010, said Amtrak.

As not all Amtrak served stations or trains offer checked baggage service, Amtrak advises passengers seeking to travel with their firearms contact Amtrak for further information.

Under the law, passengers are required by law to notify Amtrak and declare that they will be checking firearms and/or ammunition no later than 24 hours before train departure. 

All firearms (rifles, shotguns, handguns, starter pistols) must be unloaded and in an approved, locked hard-sided container. The passenger must have sole possession of the key or the combination for the lock to the container. Passengers failing to meet requirements for checking firearms will be denied transportation.

Click on the following link for more information on carrying firearms aboard Amtrak:

www.amtrak.com/servlet/ContentServer/Page/1237748590271/1237748590271

Railroad Retirement payroll taxes will remain at 2010 levels in 2011, reports the Railroad Retirement Board.

For Tier I, carriers and employees each will pay 6.20 percent on a maximum of $106,800 of wages.

For Medicare, carriers and employees each will pay 1.45 percent on all wages.

For Tier II, carriers will pay 12.10 percent and employees 3.9 percent on a maximum of $79,200 of wages.

Shippers are increasingly abandoning all-truck movements for their freight in favor of rail intermodal (trailers and containers atop rail flat cars), reports the Journal of Commerce.

Journal of Commerce trucking editor Bill Cassidy writes, “Supermarkets and shopping malls don’t have rail sidings, truckers love to point out, but the intermodal industry is moving steadily closer to the store floor.”

Increased investments in improved port transfers and the growing fleet of 53-foot long domestic containers are creating what shippers call more “seamless” transportation — hence the move to intermodal, says the Journal of Commerce.

The Association of American Railroads reported last week that through the first 46 weeks of 2010, total intermodal loads are up 14.8 percent over a similar period in 2009. 

The Association of American Railroads reports that through the first 46 weeks of 2010, total intermodal loads (trailers and containers atop rail flat cars) are up 14.8 percent over a similar period in 2009.

Intermodal loads on Class I railroads doubled from some 6 million in 1990 to more than 12 million in 2007. Although the economic downturn saw intermodal loads retreat to fewer than 10 million in 2009, they have resumed their upward climb, according to AAR statistics.

WASHINGTON – When the lame-duck Congress returns to the House and Senate floors Monday, Nov. 29, they will have until midnight Tuesday to prevent a lapse in federal long-term unemployment benefits.

If lawmakers in the House and Senate do not extend those federal unemployment benefits, some two million American workers will lose long-term unemployment benefits beginning Dec. 1.

Previous efforts to extend the benefits failed prior to the November elections as lawmakers fought over the broader question of whether to extend tax deductions for the wealthy.

In a Nov. 28 editorial, The New York Times termed the “lack of regard for working Americans” as “shocking.”

The New York Times warns that the question of “tax cuts for the rich are bound to drive and distort the debate again. Republicans and Democrats will almost certainly link the renewal of jobless benefits to an extension of the high-end Bush-era tax cuts. That would be a travesty. There is no good argument for letting jobless benefits expire, or for extending those cuts,” editorialized The New York Times.

The level of unemployment, says The New York Times in its editorial, is “the worst” in three decades, with 42 percent of almost 15 million jobless Americans unemployed for at least six months.

The UTU National Legislative Office and the AFL-CIO will continue a concerted effort to contact lawmakers urging that they put aside partisan differences and extend federal long-term unemployment benefits.

An agreement was reached with the carriers’ National Railway Labor Conference to extend until Dec. 31, 2010, the deadline for enrolling eligible dependent children for coverage under the National Railway Carriers and UTU Health and Welfare Plan (NRC/UTU) or the Railroad Employees National Health and Welfare Plan.

To obtain the enrollment packet or to obtain an enrollment form, call UnitedHealthcare’s Railroad Enrollment Service toll free at (800) 753-2692. 

This form MUST BE COMPLETED AND RETURNED to the Railroad Enrollment Service with a postmark NO LATER THAN DEC. 31 to have your eligible dependent children covered for medical benefits after Jan. 1, 2011.

This will be the final opportunity to enroll you children. There will be NO FURTHER EXTENSIONS of the deadline. 

Note that you will not be able to change your medical benefit plan administrator at this time.  This extension is only to enroll eligible dependent children for coverage under the NRC/UTU Health and Welfare Plan or the National Railroad Employees Health and Welfare Plan.

One of the jewels of the Obama administration’s health care reform allows dependent children — even those employed, so long as they are not offered insurance by their own employer — to remain on a parent’s health care insurance plan until age 26, without regard to student, marital, residence or financial dependent status. To claim the benefit, eligible dependent children must be enrolled.

Again, to obtain the enrollment packet, or to obtain a form to complete and return — POSTMARKED NO LATER THAN DEC. 31, 2010 — call UnitedHealthcare’s Railroad Enrollment Service toll free at (800) 753-2692.

WASHINGTON — The outgoing chairman of the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee – Jim Oberstar (D-Minn.), who was defeated in the Nov. 2 elections – fears increased polarization along party lines when the new Congress is seated in January.

In an interview published by cnn.com, Oberstar, who was known to exert great effort to reach bipartisan agreement, said:

“I think there will be a significant loss of ability to moderate and mediate and bring consensus together … what the election brought into the Republican Party are persons who are committed to the more extreme conservatism, and on the Democratic side those who are more hard-core liberals … governance is best when you govern from the center and reach out to bring the views of both sides to a compromise.”

Oberstar was not speaking about the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee leadership, where most transportation legislation affecting UTU airline, bus and rail members originates.

In fact, there was considerable bipartisan agreement among the T&I committee’s leadership under Oberstar’s chairmanship; and, previously, the chairmanship of now retired Republican Bud Shuster of Pennsylvania, when Oberstar was the ranking Democrat on the committee.

The new chairman of the T&I Committee will be nine-term House member John Mica (R-Fla.), who was the ranking Republican when Oberstar was chairman.

The ranking Democrat in the 2011-2012 Congress will be Nick Rahall (D-W.Va.), a 17-term veteran who is respected for his efforts at seeking bipartisan consensus.

Oberstar, who will depart Congress Dec. 31, has served in the House for 18 two-year terms.

Toys for the holidays are helping to bring furloughed train and engine crews back to work.

The Journal of Commerce reports that the number of containers (atop rail flat cars) carrying imported toys have increased by 20 percent this year compared to 2009.

The busiest ports for inbound toy shipments have been the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach in California, reports the Journal of Commerce.

More than 90 percent of imported toys originate in China., reports the Journal of Commerce.

The Association of American Railroads reports that through the first 46 weeks of 2010, total intermodal loads (trailers and containers atop rail flat cars) are up 14.8 percent over a similar period in 2009.

We need your attention.

Because your family needs you for the holidays. Because your family needs you for the new year. Because your family wants you home tomorrow and the next day, and the day after that — alive and with all four of your limbs, your two hands and two feet, all 10 of your fingers and all 10 of your toes.

So do we have your attention? Wrong.

It’s not here we want your attention. It’s on the job — every minute of every hour.  We want you focused. We want you to be aware of every situation. We want you to expect the unexpected.

That’s how you go home to your family in one piece.

The weeks ahead are, historically, the most deadly for railroad workers, with more career-ending injuries than any other period of the year.

The Switching Operations Fatalities Analysis (SOFA) working group — representatives from labor, management and the FRA — devotes itself to bringing railroaders home to their families in one piece.

SOFA’s five lifesaving tips can save yours:

  1. Secure all equipment before action is taken
  2. Protect employees against moving equipment
  3. Discuss safety at the beginning of a job or when work changes
  4. Communicate before action is taken
  5. Mentor less experienced employees to perform service safely

The SOFA working group also warns of special switching hazards:

  • Close clearances
  • Shoving movements
  • Unsecured cars
  • Free rolling rail cars
  • Exposure to mainline trains
  • Tripping, slipping or falling
  • Unexpected movement of cars
  • Adverse environmental conditions
  • Equipment defects
  • Motor vehicles or loading devices
  • Drugs and alcohol

In solidarity, and with concern for you and your family, we wish you a SAFE holiday season and urge you not to drift into a mental vacation:

Your UTU SOFA Working Group:

Louisiana State Legislative Director Gary Devall

Minnesota State Legislative Director Phil Qualy

Kansas State Legislative Director Ty Dragoo

An educational website focusing on sleep, sleep disorders and fatigue management is being created in a collaborative effort among the UTU, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, the Federal Railroad Administration, sleep medicine experts at Harvard Medical School, and Boston Public Radio station WGBH, which is Public Broadcasting’s largest producer of education  web and television content.

Input from UTU rail members, nationwide, is essential to the project.

UTU members are encouraged to complete an anonymous, online survey that should take no more than 15 minutes.

To respond to the question and complete the survey, click on the following link:

www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22BBLHSEXZA

Additional information on the project and its website — Sleep Health for Railroaders — is available by clicking on the following link:

http://sleep.med.harvard.edu/ext/railroaders/

UTU member Larry Daniel Talley (Local 1933, Washington), a conductor on Virginia Railway Express, died Nov. 21 when he lost control of his motorcycle in Montgomery County, Md., reports The Washington Post.
Talley, age 33, began his railroad career in September 2006.