But for Illawarra commuters, this Monday was looking exceptionally bad.

That’s because the Rail Tram and Bus Union were planning to go out on strike on Monday, which would have brought the South Coast train line – not to mention every other line in the state – to a halt.

Tumbleweeds would have been blowing through station platforms as workers were forced to try and find another way to get to their jobs in the Sydney CBD.

Sure, some of the lucky ones could have worked from home while others may have called in “sick”. But, for most of the region’s commuting population, a train strike would have been an enormous hurdle to overcome.

It’s now something they don’t have to worry about, given the Fair Work Commission’s order that the strike be abandoned, because it theatened to “endanger the welfare of part of the population”, in the words of the commission's senior deputy president Jonathan Hamberger.

He also said the proposed strike threatened “to cause significant damage to the economy of Sydney – the largest and most economically important city in Australia”.

This was despite the fact the strike – and the accompanying ban on overtime – was protected under law.

It’s a decision that undoubtedly disadvantages the RTBU as it takes away its right to strike in accordance with state and federal legislation.

The NSW government can now treat any threat to strike as an empty gesture, given the precedent now set by the commission.

While the Berejiklian government – and particularly Transport Minister Andrew Constance – can feel like they’ve had a win, the past week has highlighted a staggering problem with the rail system.

That is, that the timetables as they stand are simply inoperable unless train drivers work overtime.

Last Thursday, with the threat of an overtime ban, the government opted to cut services back to a weekend timetable.

That seems a clear-cut admission by the state Liberal government that its train timetable at present simply doesn’t work.

If you have devised a system that relies on people working extra hours to maintain the status quo, then that’s a system doomed to fail.