By a
vote of 6 to 3 the Illinois Toll Highway Authority’s board on April 23 decided
against continuing its project labor agreement which has required construction
contractors working on Tollway projects to use union labor exclusively,
introducing the potential for strikes and other job actions which could delay
progress on the Tollway’s completion of its 15 year, $12 billion reconstruction
and widening program.
Tollway
construction contracts awarded after May 1, 2015 will no longer be under the
project labor agreement, in which construction trade unions have promised since
1994 not to strike or engage in slow-downs on Tollway projects. Besides the
blow to the wallets of workers on Tollway projects, this policy change will
most likely seriously inconvenience millions of Chicago area commuters who face
a growing threat of ongoing traffic jams at locations where job actions could
leave construction barricades and lane closures in place far longer than they
could have remained if the project labor agreement had been renewed.
