A man was struck and killed by a train Tuesday morning near the Middletown train station in Monmouth County, officials said. A North Jersey Coast Line train, which departed Penn Station New York at 7:44 a.m. and was scheduled to arrive in Long Branch, hit the man about 9:06 a.m., according to an NJ Transit spokesperson.

There appears to be a discrepancy in the salary proposals between NJ Transit and the union representing its locomotive engineers as a strike looms.

With a potential NJ Transit train strike coming as early as May 16, the agency’s head gave no indication Tuesday that management and the agency’s union are any closer to a deal — claiming train engineers are now asking for even higher salaries than the ones NJ Transit has balked at agreeing to for months.