by Aaron M. Renn
Chronicling life riding the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA)
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The suburban Pace bus agency says that it may be forced to hike fares in order to meets it RTA set target of 40% operating cost farebox recovery. Currently Pace only projects that it will recover 38.4% of its operating costs. Metra is require to recover 55% of operating costs from fares, and the CTA 51%. [ However, these do not include capital costs, where the CTA, and especially Metra, receive far greater subsidies than Pace ] [ Source: Chicago Tribune 15 September 2000 ]
The CTA is eliminating three bus stops on Clark St. in the Loop. Stops at Washington, Monroe, and Jackson were eliminated. I am all in favor of this. It shouldn't be that difficult to walk an extra block and if there is a wheelchair rider, I see no reason why the CTA can't drop him off at any corner he wants regardless of whether there is an official bus stop there. Clark St. in particular has way too many bus stops, not just in the Loop, but through a lot of the north side. I say thining them out would greatly speed the trip to downtown, which can now be very long indeed.
John C. Thomas wrote in to say:
Is it my imagination, or have a large number of the signs on the front of the bus indicating the route all malfunctioned at the same time? The problem appears to be particularly acute with the #147. Many busses on the 147 route appear with sloppy hand-drawn signs. One day, an empty bus rolled up with no signage at all. I had to ask the driver what route it was, and she said 147. Then, I had to take a piece of paper from by briefcase, scrawl "147" on it, and stick it in the front window before anyone boarded the bus.
I have noticed a lot of these malfunctioning lately.
Sometimes when I am running late to work, I catch UP North train number 324, which leaves Main St. at 8:40a and arrives at Northwestern Station at 9:03a. For some unexplained reason, this train is only four cars long. As a result, it is always overcrowded. When it departs Main St., basically every seat is taken and by the time it leaves Ravenswood, there are many involuntary standees. I've considered writing to Metra about this problem, but I know that this is a useless thing to do. Many people have written Metra's rider newsletter about seat shortages, and Metra has never in my experience done anything but claim that there are seats and that riders should try another car.
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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