Helsinki City Transport drivers to strike on Monday - traffic chaos likely

Eastern suburbs particularly vulnerable

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Services on the trams, metro trains, and a sizeable part of the bus lines operated by Helsinki City Transport (HKL) will come to a halt on Monday morning at 03.00 hours (GMT+3), as drivers launch a protest strike. Staff at HKL’s repair shop and service depots will also be taking part in the stoppage. The duration of the protest is as yet unclear, but it will last at least 24 hours, and will seriously hamper commuters on Monday, particularly those coming from the eastern suburbs of the city.
     
The strike action is in protest against the possible fusion of HKL’s bus services and Suomen Turistiauto (a City-owned company), since the HKL Bus Transport staff wish to retain bus operations as a municipally-owned commercial enterprise. They have nothing intrinsically against the planned merger, but roundly reject the idea that the two operators would be formed into a separate limited company. There are fears that the next step might be the selling-off of the new company to the private sector.
      HKL employs a total of approximately 1,400 drivers in buses, trams, and on the metro network.
     
The decision to strike was taken in two meetings on Thursday evening, arranged by workers belonging to KTV (the Trade Union for the Municipal Sector) and by members of KVL (the Federation of Municipal Officers).
      "Our meeting was unanimous in its views. The only discussion was over the length of the stoppage", said Helsinki City Transport’s KTV chief shop steward Tapio Havasto. The length of the protest was left open, and the KTV members will convene on Monday afternoon at 17.00 to decide on how to continue their protest action.
      Drivers belonging to the other union, KVL, also resolved on a protest stoppage. "We wanted to send a signal to the City Council by this show of dissent", said KVL chief shop steward Marko Jouppila after their Thursday meeting. KVL’s stoppage will end on Tuesday morning at 2.30 a.m.
     
The 85-member Helsinki City Council will vote on the merging of HKL’s Bus Transport and Suomen Turistiauto’s bus operations on September 15th.
      In the view of Pekka Sauri (Greens), the City’s Deputy Mayor for Public Works and Environmental Affairs, the worries over a privatisation sell-off are unfounded. "The City has no intention of selling the company. All the shares will remain under the thumb of the City Board", said Sauri on Thursday.
      Tero Anttila, the General Manager of HKL’s Bus Transport, also pointed out on Thursday that the strike was illegal and would only undermine confidence in the reliability of the public transport system, driving passengers to use cars instead.
     
The absence of buses, trams, and metro transport on Monday morning is clearly going to bring a rude shock to commuters heading into Helsinki.
      Around 700,000 journeys are made on Helsinki City Transport vehicles on an average weekday. Although drivers working for Suomen Turistiauto will not be taking part, there will be drastic reductions in the public transport capacity on Monday.
      HKL have calculated that at rush-hours, as much as 70% of the passenger traffic volume travelling into or out of the centre of Helsinki is made up of public transport. The stoppage will hit residents of the eastern suburbs particularly badly, as these are completely reliant on bus and metro links. From the north and north-west, there is at least the alternative of commuter rail services, operated by Finnish Railways (VR).
      Trains are likely to be uncomfortably full, unless VR arranges extra rolling-stock on rush-hour departures.
      Espoo and Vantaa buses will be running normally, but these are likely to be full by the time they reach Helsinki city limits, and several take motorways rather than going through the Helsinki suburbs.


Links:
  Helsinki City Transport
  KTV
  KVL

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