'Greening work'in Lean Times: The Amalgamated Transit Union and Public Transit.

This paper examines the Amalgamated Transit Union’s (ATU) discussion of environmental issues since the mid 1980s. We explore the trialectic relationship between capital, labour and nature in Canada’s public transit unions, primarily through the lens of labour geography. In a review of union documents and Canadian newspapers we find the state uses the environment as a wedge issue in its ‘war or position’ with unions, representing workers’ strike actions as harmful to the environment and the community. The state’s positioning of ATU members as crucial to both the functioning of communities and environmental sustainability lends itself to counter-hegemonic campaign strategies. We examine a recent campaign by Toronto’s ATU Local 113 entitled “Protecting What Matters” as a local union’s community and environmental strategies during a period of austerity. The paper concludes with lessons learned from a labour geography perspective and calls for a more community based approach to resistance.