STRIKE'S SOBERING IMPACT

Strike's Sobering Impact

His language sometimes was intemperate during the three-day transit walkout, but Mayor Bloomberg was correct in declaring last Wednesday, "There are no winners in a strike."

Once whatever wage agreement is reached can be assessed, conclusions might be drawn about which side did better as a result of the pressures brought to bear by the walkout. But both Transport Workers' Union Local 100 and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority ought to be more than a bit sobered by the way that the life of the city was disrupted, and the impact it had on so many people.

That is the part that tends to get left out of the fond stories transit workers past and present tell about the 12-day walkout in 1966 when the union was deemed to have triumphed over new Mayor John V. Lindsay. But the collateral damage could be easily grasped last week: the thousands of students, particularly at the high school level, who could not get to classes; the workers who could not get to their jobs without mass transit; the small businesses, from stores that depend heavily on Christmas week for income to the news dealers located at subway stations whose business evaporated with no customers heading to or from the trains. It was a particular hardship for the elderly and the infirm who would ordinarily have relied on mass transit, sometimes for medical treatment. Those are just some of the people and enterprises for whom the strike was more than just an inconvenience that was manageable if you could handle traffic jams, more expensive commuter rail fares, or feet made sore by longer walks than many of us are accustomed to.

TWU Local 100 President Roger Toussaint has looked to build links with the people of this city, and many of those who were hardest-hit are those with whom he and his members would strongly identify. That is surely one reason why the contract movement produced when mediators stepped in to restart the talks persuaded him to have members return to work, even though a final deal had not yet been reached.

The fact that one part of his internal opposition railed against his decision to order union members back to work shows that they remain as oblivious to the wider world of this city as when one member of the group declared six years ago that it would be a good thing to strike and disrupt the "orgy of profit-taking" that he perceived as the primary business of the holiday shopping season.

The MTA also yielded to reason by relaxing its hard line on compelling future employees to accept inferior pensions. While most of the bile contained in newspaper editorials and commentaries was directed at Mr. Toussaint and his union, both sides were equally responsible for the failure that produced the walkout.

The Local 100 leader had made clear that he considered the pension matter grounds for a strike if it was still on the table at the union's Dec. 20 deadline. MTA Chairman Peter Kalikow tinkered with the proposal, but that did nothing to alter the principle that he was asking the union to forsake. The fact that Mr. Toussaint did not respond to the offer made before Mr. Kalikow's final pre-strike revision should have told the MTA Chairman that a strike was bearing down on him.

It turned into a game of chicken, and when Local 100 ordered the walkout, positions on both sides predictably hardened. Thanks to the work of the mediators who were quickly brought in - Richard Curreri, Martin Scheinman and Al Viani - perspective was restored and the parties began dealing with their differences.

Transit workers have been the subject of curses and invective from both ordinary citizens and the special beings who write editorials for the city's tabloids. In a couple of ways, though, the strike may help them.

It made clear to the public that lack of fair treatment by New York City Transit management is a widespread concern. It also reminded New Yorkers that, notwithstanding the legitimate gripes about sometimes balky service, incoherent public-address systems and the practice of not holding trains in a station so that locals can connect with expresses if one of the trains is behind schedule, the system works pretty well. Mr. Bloomberg is far from the only prominent executive who will admit that the subway is often a faster way to move through Manhattan than by car in streets clotted by traffic.

That is why the subways and buses are so vital a part of the city's business life. We hope that riders will appreciate just how important transit workers are to their existence.

Local 100 members should be grateful for the support they received from other unions' leaders, both in public and behind the scenes. Part of the reason was self-interest, since a pension change would surely have spurred Governor Pataki and the Mayor to seek a similar concession, but the solidarity also reflected those labor leaders' understanding of the importance of the TWU and a determination that it not be trampled by a barrage of anti-union sentiment from other quarters.

Special thanks should also be given to the city workers, from Traffic Enforcement Agents keeping the overload of vehicles at the entrances to Manhattan reasonably orderly, to the cops who were out in force as people walked over bridges and to the railroads into the late hours through areas that are usually desolate. They helped remind people of the value of dedicated public servants.

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