LAWRENCE — Martin Leahy, 61, like many people in Lawrence, relies on the Merrimack Valley Transit bus system to get around. The current transit worker strike, however, has left him stuck in place.
Leahy, who was formerly unhoused, frequently meets with his caseworker at the Community Action drop-in center in Haverhill, roughly 9 miles away. Without the bus, however, he has no way of seeing her or getting to any of his doctors’ appointments.
“I got two appointments coming,” Leahy said Friday, sitting on a bench in the sweltering heat, looking out onto Lawrence’s North Canal, “a dentist in Haverhill and a psychiatrist in North Andover.”
“This has really screwed me up,” Leahy said.
The free bus service powered by Merrimack Valley Transit, or MeVa, serves 16 cities and towns in northeast Massachusetts, according to its website. The service district is centered on gateway cities along the Merrimack River, such as Lawrence.
The Merrimack Valley Transit agency and its workers, who are members of the Teamsters Local 170 union, are at loggerheads over proposed changes by the agency, which include removing Saturday overtime shifts and instead incorporating Saturdays into drivers’ regular schedule.
This would change the current system that has been in place since 1976, in which workers could choose whether they wanted to work Saturdays, according to James D. Marks, a business agent for Local 170.
The agency’s proposed concession to raise workers’ pay by 25 percent within three years remains unaccepted by the union workers.
Marks said this is because the proposal would still leave workers with less money than they could have earned in overtime.
The union workers, 138 bus drivers, mechanics, and cleaning technicians, have been on strike since Wednesday, and as a result, the buses have halted.
“I’m trying to get back to Haverhill,” said Leahy, “but right now I’m just sitting here.”
Some people in town were unaware that the buses had stopped.
José Bencome, 30, of Brookline, came into Lawrence on the commuter rail Friday for an appointment. After getting off the train in Lawrence, however, he realized that his transportation plans were foiled.
“I thought I would use the bus, but it’s not available,” Bencome said in Spanish, looking confusedly at the “No service due to strike sign” inside the bus terminal.
When a friend he called was unable to pick him up, Bencome sighed and resolved to call an Uber.
Fitzgerald Billett, 70, didn’t know a strike had caused the buses to stop until he was told by a Globe reporter.
Billett, who has lived in Lawrence since moving from Jamaica 42 years ago, waited at the bus stop for 30 minutes on Thursday to get groceries from Walmart. When the bus never came, Billett assumed they must have been halted for the holiday weekend.
“It kind of frustrates me,” Billett said, sipping a Gatorade on a bench at the corner of Union and Essex streets in Lawrence, “because most people go to Walmart to try and buy things for cheaper there.”
The nearest Walmart in Methuen is most easily accessible by bus for people from Lawrence who, like Billett, don’t have cars.
The free bus ride compared with a $10 taxi ride each way is just not affordable for many people who are already going to Walmart for the reduced prices, Billett said.
Like Billett, Yudelka Rubio, 70, also relies on the bus to get to affordable stores.
“I use it for the stores, to buy things, and sometimes to go to the doctor,” Rubio said in Spanish.
In the height of the heat wave, Rubio, who moved to Lawrence seven years ago from the Dominican Republic, has found the absence of buses particularly trying.
Rubio said that she normally would have taken the bus to a pool on a day like this. Instead, she sits restlessly on a bench in Campagnone Common.
“I can’t go anywhere,” she said.
It is unclear when the strike will end.
“I don’t know why or what happened,” Leahy said, shaking his head, “this sort of came out of nowhere.”
Jane Miller can be reached at jane.miller@globe.com.