"Claim on behalf of the General Committee of the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen on the CSX Transportation, Inc. (formerly C&O, Chesapeake District):

Claim on behalf of J. E. Rusak, for 8 hours at the Signal Maintainer's straight time rate of pay, account Carrier violated the current Signalmen's Agreement, particularly Addendum 2 (Vacation), when it distributed more than 25 percent of the workload of a vacationing employee to the Claimant without providing a relief worker on August 28, 2002. The vacationing employee's territory was on the Peninsula Subdivision from MP CA 27.8 to MP CA 53.4. The work consisted of securing the road crossing at Lightfoot Road, trouble shooting, and removing and replacing a damaged GCP 3000 grade crossing predictor. Carrier's File No. 03-0014. General Chairman's File No. 03-11-CD. BRS File Case No. 12759 C&O (CD)."

The carrier or carriers and the employee or employees involved in this dispute are respectively carrier and employee within the meaning of the Railway Labor Act, as approved June 21, 1934.

This Division of the Adjustment Board has jurisdiction over the dispute involved herein.

Parties to said dispute were given due notice of hearing thereon.

The Organization's October 24, 2002 claim asserts that the Carrier violated Addendum 2 of the Agreement when it required the Claimant to absorb in excess of 25 percent of the work load of a fellow Signal Maintainer on an adjoining territory while he took a vacation day.

The Carrier denied the claim on December 20, 2002 and again on appeal on March 28, 2003, stating in part as follows:

"The Organization has failed to prove the agreement was violated when CSXT used the claimant on the date at issue to perform basic signal maintenance work, which is not specifically reserved to any signal employee including vacationing employee Smith.

It is well recognized the heavy burden of evidence required by the Organization when pursuing claims filed in regard to the National Vacation agreement provisions. Not only should the claim contain the specific duties and time involved in doing the work of the vacationing employee, but also how the work assignment `burdened' the remaining employee(s)."

In a case about the nature and volume of work performed and the manner in which it unduly burdens the Signalman to which assigned, no reliable determination can be made regarding violation without detailed and specific evidence. The state of this case as it comes before the Board is such that it plainly does not satisfy the standards established by prior arbitral authority applying the vacation provisions at

06-3-03-3-538