by Aaron M. Renn
Chronicling life riding the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA)
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CTA President Frank Kruesi wrote a letter to the editor claiming that (surprise, surprise) the sweetheart land deal for the former Limits Garage property given to a close fried of Mayor Daly was legit. [ Source: Chicago Tribune 30 October 1999 ]
Here's some belated news from the CTA year 2000 budget. Capital spending is $409 million, up from $235 million last year thanks to additional monies supplied under Illinois FIRST. The operating budget is $841 million. No fare increase is planned. Again, the CTA is taking full credit for ridership increases this year. The yuppie housing boom in the city and the booming Loop job market were not mentioned at all by them. [ Source: Chicago Tribune 11 November 1999 ]
Amanda Cohen, the creme de la femme of chi.general, wrote in to say:
Okay, this isn't exactly "news," but it was new to me. This morning, when I went to add my customary $10 to my fare card (because anyone who adds less than $10 at a time isn't getting the one break that CTA offers), my nice blue card was replaced by a minty green card with an Altoids ad printed on it. Well, I was happy to see that CTA has found yet another way to generate some revenue. I guess this means they won't need to raise fares anytime soon, right? Ya, we should be so lucky. But my one complaint about this little advertising fare card is that the pale minty green color makes it hard to see the white triangle-arrow that indicates which part of the card goes in first when paying the fare. I'm a bit dyslexic, and I always have to triple-check my card to make sure I'm putting it in correctly. Now I can barely see the arrow. Would it have been that hard to put a red outline around it or something? Just to minimize the card-fumbling that slows down the boarding process.
nospam-LarryS1050@aol.com wrote in with a few experiences:
Last April a group of us were returning to Linden Ave after attending a CERA meeting downtown. We left Merchandise Mart about 9:30pm via the Brown Line and connected with the northbound Red line at Fullerton. Upon arrival at Fullerton we noted that the platform was rather full. Immediately we suspected that there were problems which there were. The northbound train arrived late (nothing new). My friend Scott from Evanston immediately noted that the train was running in bypass as signified by the color lights on the front of the train which were both red. In other words the cab signal on the front car which was one of the newer rebuilt 2600 series cars was not working. And as usual neither was the pa system in our car. It didn't matter as we knew where we were going but pity the poor guy who possibly didn't.When we arrived at Howard Street the Purple Line was nowhere in sight. Our train arrived on the outermost track and our follower running on time arrived on the inside track right behind us. Both trains sat there and sat there. I didn't know if the tower man at Howard had gone to sleep or what! Pretty soon, I saw that the problem was a street person who had gone to sleep on the train. They spent almost 10 minutes trying to wake him up by pounding on the window until someone finally realized that they'd have to get on the train and do the job, By this time the train has been sitting there for at least 15 minutes. And our follower hadn't moved either.
Before long the Purple line train arrived from Linden and proceeded to the switchback where it would eventually turn back to load for its return trip to Linden Avenue. Meanwhile two more Red Line trains had arrived at Howard with no place to go.
Finally, after extracting the street person the Red Line train we were on left for the Howard loop. The next Red Line train immediately pulled in to discharge passengers. This time CTA personnel were lead on a car to car chase by another passenger who didn't wish to leave the train at Howard. Meantime the follower to our train was still sitting there as was the Purple Line train which had no place to go. Not until three more Red Line trains had arrived did it seem to dawn on the Howard Street tower operator that the northbound Purple Line was awaiting a track. It was cold and windy and by the time we got on the Purple Line train we were thoroughly chilled. I think we stood at Howard for at least 30 minutes. It never seemed to dawn on CTA personnel at Howard that they could get these people off the train when it had looped around. Instead they inconvenienced everyone waiting to go to Linden Avenue for the sake of two homeless people.
In June of last year I was once again riding north to Howard. We had just rounded the curve at Sheridan when the train halted. I didn't understand the announcement over the pa as to why we were stopping so out of curiosity I walked up to the front car. It turned out that a part of the el structure was on fire and the train operator had to put it out. The problem was that her fire extinguisher was apparently empty. This necessitated stopping a southbound train and borrowing his extinguisher. The operator of our train who looked as if she had never missed a meal could barely climb back aboard the train. In fact several passengers had to help pull her back on board. From here all the way to Howard she did nothing but complain for all to hear how none of the "menses" had gotten off the train and helped her fight the fire. I had to wonder what she was thinking? That's a live 600 volt third rail out there and I wanted no part of it. Furthermore, I strongly suspect that the CTA would have taken a very dim view of passengers running around on the el structure.
Part of the reason we use the Red Line is to avoid driving all the way to the Loop and paying those God awful parking prices. Ever since Amtrak dropped its late night (11:00pm) train to Milwaukee we have been forced to drive to and from CERA meetings. Taking METRA means leaving the meeting early to catch the 9:35pm back to Kenosha or waiting until past Midnight for the last trip to Kenosha which arrives at the delightful time of 2:15am. And then there's still the drive to Milwaukee which takes another 40 minutes. How nice it would be to turn back the clock and bring back the North Shore Line. Of course our "wonderful" governor, Tommy G. Thompson who is also Chairman of the Amtrak Board of Directors is promising 110mph service on the Chicago-Milwaukee corridor by 2005. If you believe that this will ever be a reality I've got some great ocean front property in Arizona I'd like to sell you!
And Jonothan is back this week with lots of good info as always:
A lot of changes coming to CTA soon. The bulk of these changes will be mostly behind the scenes and won't really affect the riders. Starting December 12, 1999, the CTA System Pick goes into effect. A system pick is where full-time bus operators are given the option of working at a different bus garage. The system pick is held every 2 years. There is going to be a lot of operators changing garages, especially at North Park garage. North Park garage's extremely poor management plus the unavailability of overtime has driven almost a fourth of the full time bus drivers away from that garage. This resulted in many operators with low seniority being bumped over to North Park from other garages.Speaking of North Park, the official word from that garage is that they are now authorizing overtime. This is the first time this has happened in about 5 years. And it is really about time, too, especially since all the other bus garages have been authorizing overtime for quite a while now. Lots of rumors going around about North Park's general manager leaving. She has really done quite a number on that garage, helping to bring down morale and driving away almost a fourth of the operators from that garage. She is so bad that she has earned herself the nickname "rolling thunder". She was really against the bus drivers and I feel personally that it is time that she leave and I hope that they will place a GM there who has some people skills. But, rumors come and go so often at CTA that one can't know what is true until it happens.
Lastly, North Park is the latest garage to participate in Operation Clearview, CTA's program to eliminate graffiti from its buses. All the TMC buses (series 4400) have had their windows replaced, and the others will follow soon. North Park operates routes 11-22-36-49B-93-96-97-120-121-122-123-135-136-145-146-147-151-155-201-202-203- 204.
and Jon also had this followup:
I have more information about North Park management's recent decision to authorize overtime. Apparently, the bus operators out of that garage have their union reps to thank for that. The union reps put together a long letter that listed the problems with North Park garage and a bunch of grievances the employees had against management. Copies of this letter were sent by certified mail to Ms. Bledsoe (general manager of North Park), Mr. Winston (vice-president of transit operations), Ms. Jarrett (chairman of the CTA board), and Mr. Kruesi (president of CTA). Well, when Mr. Kruesi received his letter, he asked the union rep to see him, and the next day, he spoke with Ms. Bledsoe, and had her start authorizing overtime. So, those of you on the Gold Coast should start seeing all the buses out on the street that are supposed to be out on the street.Thinking about all this, I have come to an important conclusion. I realize now that because this went on for so long, that upper management (that being the president of CTA and the board members) probably didn't have a clue what was going on at this garage. It took a bus driver (who is also the union rep) to finally bring to light what was going on. I have a feeling that many of the things that go on in operations only go as far as Mr. Winston, and that's it. So, I truly believe that the president and board members don't have a clue as to what transpires in CTA's service delivery division. This whole incident just proves it.
The Weekly Breakdown is a small Internet journal devoted to the trials and tribulations of being a regular rider of the Chicago Transit Authority. I would be happy to hear about and include your experiences. Just send mail to breakdown@urbanophile.com. The views expressed by contributors are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of the publisher.
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