Austria was deprived of rail services for two hours today, due to a strike of its main railway union. The company’s train traffic was suspended across the country between 12 and 2 PM. Since 2PM traffic has resumed, although passengers should still take into account possible delays, the press office of the rail operator confirmed.

The strike was initiated after failed payment negotiations during the last few days. On Sunday, the Austrian Chamber of Commerce proposed an improved deal to the trade union, however, the latter decided to hold the warning strike regardless. On its Twitter account, ÖBB stated: “We apologise to all our customers for the inconvenience.” The strike caused suspension of all the trains, including international ones. Austria stopped to accept or transfer the trains from neighbouring countries.

Service resumed

Since 2pm he ÖBB started resuming railway traffic structured again. The long-distance trains continued their journey from 2PM, while local traffic followed directly afterwards. “Passengers must take into account possible delays in any case until the late afternoon. However, ÖBB is doing everything in its power to facilitate regulated train traffic as quickly as possible”, the company stated.

The ÖBB assumed that around 100,000 passengers were affected by the strikes. Some local authorities replaced trains with bus services. Wiener Linien, a public transit operator in Vienna, accepted ÖBB tickets during the strike. Buses also carried passengers to and from Vienna Airport, continuing the airports of Linz and Graz. The transport system of the Austrian westernmost state Vorarlberg replaced trains with 30 buses. It is worth noting that ÖBB Group has 41,107 employees that serve 1.3 million travellers daily.