Wednesday 23 November 2022 10:53 PM Fears New York's poo trains could become STUCK in the city as rail strike nears trends now
The looming national rail strike could turn into a literal s**tshow as New York City's 'poop trains,' which carry 2.4 million pounds of human waste, could become stuck.
After a tentative deal brokered by the Biden administration fell through on Monday, about 60,000 rail workers could enter a strike in early December, upending the nation's railway system and sinking $2 billion a day.
New York City, however, could see more than economic losses as its five boroughs transports 2.4 million pounds of waste a day via railroads to cheap landfills across in the South, The Daily Beast reports.
Should the trains back up, residents stand to face the same disgusting fate seen in 2018 in Alabama, where people were forced to wear masks to escape the foul odor when the trains were stuck their for two months.
On Tuesday, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said that the potential rail strike 'is not acceptable' after unions representing more than half the country's freight rail workers rejected new contracts and threatened a walkout on December 5.
New York City's 'poop trains' (above), which carry 2.4 million pounds of human waste a day, could be stuck amid a looming railroad workers strike
The trains drew headlines when one of them was got stuck at an Alabama town in 2018 (above) on its way to a landfill. The incident forced residents to put on masks to escape the odor
New York city sends exports its human waste partly because the federal government in the late 1980s banned disposal in the Atlantic Ocean.
Along with the possibility of millions of pounds of human excrement remaining in the city, The Big Apple also risks a garbage pile up.
The New York City Sanitation Commissioner's Office noted that the city ships out about 87 percent of its household waste by railway, which amounts to 20 million pounds of garbage.
The railroad provides a quick route for the city to transport its waste while clearing the roads of dump trucks filled with waste.
Sanitation Commissioner Jessica Tisch told The Daily Beast that given its dependence on the railroads, the city has been working on backup plans should the strike go through on December 5.
'We have spent the past several months monitoring the ongoing possibility of a freight rail workers strike extremely closely and [are] making contingency plans to transition back to shipping trash by truck in the event of a work stoppage,' Tisch said.
'We are working
