Newark Penn Station was a hive of confusion Friday morning as thousands of commuters struggled to navigate the first day of a transit strike that shut down all of NJ Transit’s rail service.
Riders squinted at their phones and checked with transit agents who tried to help crowds figure out alternate routes, whether by bus, ferry, PATH or Amtrak.
Preschool teacher Monica Williams, 34, said she usually commutes with her sister on an NJ Transit train out of Newark before taking a short bus ride to the Edison, New Jersey school where they both work. But with the agency’s trains out and no direct bus to Edison, the pair were dumbfounded to learn their only other mass transit option was a ride to nearby MetroPark via Amtrak, which charged $70 for the 17-minute ride.
“ Now we have to miss out on our lessons and teaching and things that we love to do because they’re on strike,” she said. “ We actually are not financially equipped to take a $70 train ride to Edison and then pay an additional $70 to come back.”
Riders weren’t happy wake up Friday to learn of a NJ Transit rail strike.
Stephen Nessen
Williams and her sister were just two of NJ Transit’s 100,000-plus weekday train riders stuck in the middle of New Jersey’s biggest transit labor fight in a generation. The agency’s locomotive engineers walked off the job at 12:01 a.m. Friday after transit officials failed to reach a contract agreement with the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen.
The two sides were scheduled to return to the negotiating table on Sunday, leaving some hope service would be restored in time for Monday morning’s commute.
The first moments of the strike stranded Manhattan doorman Jay Santana, whose shift finishes at 11 p.m. He said he normally takes an NJ Transit train home to South Jersey out of New York Penn just after midnight — but was unable to board due to the strike. Instead, he crashed in the city overnight in a bunk room at the building where he works, and still didn’t know how he would get home Friday night.
“I gotta get home. Probably gotta take the Uber, I got no choice,” said a crestfallen Santana, 45. “I just hope everything gets resolved.”
Gridlock in Manhattan has improved in recent months thanks to the MTA’s congestion pricing toll, but Friday’s NJ Transit strike brought it back with a vengeance as drivers funneled into the Holland Tunnel.
Ramsey Khalifeh
It wasn’t any better for drivers, who ran into gridlock in Manhattan after the strike.
Construction worker Lewis Covolus said he had been stuck in traffic en route to the Holland Tunnel for more than an hour Friday afternoon as he tried to get home to Old Bridge.
“I take the train every day for 10 years,” said Covolus. “How could you not move traffic in this city? It’s horrible. No wonder people want to leave this place.”
The meltdown was just as frustrating for NJ Transit riders like Brenda Mack, who already paid for a monthly pass to cover her commute from Union County to her banking job in Midtown. She drove down to Newark Penn to catch a PATH train, and was disappointed to learn her NJ Transit ticket was not being cross-honored on the Port Authority’s trains.
Gov. Phil Murphy earlier in the week called for New Jerseyans to work from home during the strike if possible.
Mack raised a skeptical eyebrow at that suggestion: “ I tried that with my boss and he gave me sketchy answers, which means, ‘Get your butt into work.’”
Brenda Mack, who commutes from Union County in New Jersey to Midtown, had a terrible time getting to work on Friday.
Stephen Nessen
Shaqua Houston, 32, a nurse aid from Newark who commutes to Washington Heights, was forced to take the PATH on Friday, which added time to her commute. But she said that paled in comparison to her fears of getting to MetLife Stadium next week for a Beyonce show. She said she didn’t want to have to take an Uber to the Cowboy Carter Tour concert.
“ I’m hoping that they really come to an agreement Sunday. Really, really hoping. Really, really hoping,” she said.
Scuba equipment salesperson Adeline Murphy, 25, might have had a better time swimming across the Hudson River than navigating the platforms at Newark Penn on Friday. She normally commutes to SoHo from Montclair, and aimed to board a PATH train on Friday — but soon found out it was an exorbitantly priced Amtrak train.
“ They’re not letting people on unless they buy an Amtrak ticket, which is weird,” Murphy said. “Most of the trains, it’s like you get on and then they ask for a ticket. But you couldn’t even sneak by. There was a conductor blocking the door, getting tickets.”
