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Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, United Transportation Union and six railroads (Burlington Northern Santa Fe, Conrail, CSX Transportation, Kansas City Southern, Norfolk Southern Railway and Union Pacific Railroad) June 25 agreed to a set of procedures for upcoming arbitration hearings on locomotive remote controls, according to a BLE-prepared statement.


The tripartite agreement was reached after months of negotiations. The three parties couldn't agree on a single question to pose to arbitrators, so each submitted its own question. An arbitration panel soon will render a decision on those questions, BLE said.


BLE officials believe locomotive engineers should operate remote controls; UTU in October obtained signed letters of intent from all U.S. Class Is, assigning remote-control operations to the railroads' UTU-represented workers.


BLE officials expect the dispute to be resolved at year's end.