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Metra hiring more coach cleaners
That figure includes benefits, employer’s share of taxes, etc. I believe the total cost of employment is about double the employee’s salary. Still, it’s probably better pay than I get in my government job.
Who among you wants to play God and decide what doing some of the dirtiest work there is to do on a passenger railroad is worth? Anyone who thinks this is a good salary ought to apply.
Let’s see how long you last walking around storage yards on less than optimum footing and climbing up into the equipment in all kinds of weather. These workers are the unsung heroes and the underpinnings of what makes a good commuter railroad.
1,900,000 / 31 =61290.32 for 2013 and
2,500,000 / 31 =80645.16 for 2014.
I guess this is the going rate for this job in Chicago. It looks like a lot to me, but I’m not in Chicago. I do know I would leave those trains spotless in my area (SE VA) for that much pocket change.
Something has to be wrong with the figures, unless the car cleaning supervisors are getting a big bite of it.
And if you do the math, that’s roughly four to five coaches per person per shift, assuming that a coach only gets cleaned once a day (probably not true). In general, my Metra experience says that the coaches just need picking up more than anything else. In the winter, probably a mopping when it snows, but not a lot of heavy cleaning if they stay on top of the little things. Obviously, if a passenger has been ill or messes up the bathroom, it could take a while (and make for an extremely nasty job). And, yes, I know that happens more than most folks would like. Still, it seems like this isn’t a horrible job on many days and not particularly taxing. The 18th Street coach yard has nicely plowed walkways and the coaches are generally plugged in to power, so I would expect lighting, heat and a/c. Yes, heaving cleaning equipment into the coaches is a fair amount of work and you really can’t effectively haul the gear between cars.
As far as the pay goes, I would expect that these are union jobs, so the $40k base is about right, with a heavy load for benefits. That makes the wage around $20 an hour. Obviously, janitorial services could be obtained at a lesser pay scale if the work were outsourced, but I’m not prepared to speak to that.
David it it right on the head. The figure of 80+K a year is the total cost of an employee. You have to figure in the employers costs that include anything from heath insurance to unemployment insurance and the Chicago head tax.
To all you guys think that the coach cleaners are over paid, then why don’t you apply for these cushy jobs. Then you can clean up the garbage that you spew! And by the way, where’s Jeffery? I was expecting his garbage that he would have thrown our way!
4-5 coaches/person/shift seems like a full enough day’s work. Yes, keeping up on the little things will keep ahead of the ‘big jobs’ but they can’t be put off indefinitly. There are a lot of corners to poke around to make sure all seats are cleaned, windows cleaned, bathrooms cleaned and restocked (this alone means wiping down a lot of surfaces), washing off spilled coffee & soda that has dried on, sweeping and occasionally mopping. Then pulling eveything out of one coach to the next. Allowing for restocking the cleaning carts and putting everything away at the end of a shift-plus a 30 minute lunch break-5 cars/8 hours seems reasonable.
$2.5 million in 2014 for 31 employees equals over $80,000 per employee per year. Seems like a lot for just cleaning cars, maybe this is more like a government make work project?
1.9 million divided by 31 is $61,290 per employee. What do the do? Lick the coaches clean?
Chicago does not have a head tax. Nor does it have an income tax.
A real good idea would be if the"Commuters" did not treat the equipment like they do. Sure weather issues, and even the person that gets sick requires cleaning service. But picking up newspapers, cofxfeee cups and other human debris could be easily done by the riders, they have to walk by the garbarge cans leaving the train. Probably too busy “Texting”.
about time!
Are they doing a full daily cleaning or just a quick sweep? Back in the mid 80’s NYCTA subway car cleaners were assigned to sweep out 3 whole cars per shift, and it would take them about 15 minutes per each car. The rest of the overnight shift was spent sleeping and the like, and they were often sent home early with a designated card puncher taking care of things. But if these cleaners actually do a good cleaning of the car, that does take a lot more time.