Union members cited five years without wage increases and said the new contract aims to bring NJ Transit wages closer to regional norms, which average around $113,000 a year for NJ Transit engineers, with union demands aiming as high as $170,000 a year.

NJ Transit pushed a critical service advisory to its hundreds of thousands of customers Thursday, urging them to get to their destinations before midnight or risk being stranded at the start of the first rail strike in decades.

This is a very sensitive time. Nobody wants to upend a deal,” said Bill Dwyer, a professor in the Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations.