NJ Transit President and CEO Kris Kolluri said the two sides have had “constructive” meetings this week in Newark and in Washington D.C.

After dueling press conferences filled with fiery rhetoric on Friday, NJ Transit and a locomotive engineers union met in Washington Monday for talks to avoid a rail strike.

If the engineers do walk off the job, the agency plans to increase bus service, saying it would add “very limited” capacity to existing New York commuter bus routes in close proximity to rail stations and will contract with private carriers to operate bus service from key regional park-and-ride locations during weekday peak periods.