There wasn't any money to move it over to Ashland. Building an entirely new viaduct would pose numerous challenges (crossing the Eisenhower, moving sewer pipes and utilities under the road, etc).

Plus, you'd get an unsightly viaduct running down the middle of Ashland. It's much better in an alley, where buildings can conceal the tracks and muffle the sound. It also means CTA doesn't have to worry so much about the aesthetics of the track and structure, and can sink more dollars into stations and other public areas of the system.

The ROW North of Lake St. has been extensively built over, and would require much acquisition and clearance to restore rail service.

Yeah, but the neighborhoods (Ukranian Village, Wicker Park, Bucktown) would never allow a new elevated line to be built past their homes. If, God forbid, the Circle Line is ever built, it will be in a subway north of Lake Street.

Wacker drive expecting 125 concrete trucks tomorrow. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/l...,7600828.story

Do you know what those plastic pipes in Wacker Dr. are for? Are they for heating the street in the winter?

A new ORD express rail site now open......

Let's choose up sides for convenience:

I am first on the "It'll Never Happen - For Good Reason" side.

But that has nothing to do with the Paulina Connector.

^The Paulina Connector—back when it was just the main stem of the Met—extended all the way north to Milwaukee Ave. Today, the only real purpose is to interconnect the system; it's the only way to get rolling stock from the Blue Line to the rest of the network. To get state money to rebuild it, CTA pretended it was the first phase of a "Circle Line," but the state called their bluff and told them to run revenue service over it or give the money back. So CTA had to invent the Pink Line.

No, probably for post-tensioned rebar rods. Post-tensioning the slabs allows them to be several inches thinner than the old slabs.

Doesn’t the Pink Line also help with resource utilization and frequency—by being separate from the Blue Line the Cermak branch can run shorter trains at higher frequencies.

I finally sat down to describe how I think my suggestion for a real airport express/downtown circulator might actually operate, and I sent it to that new group advocating for a private airport express, telling them a public/private partnership that did more than just a West Loop to O'Hare run might be syngergistically far better.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5052/...1258020a_b.jpg

What I sent them:

^ Interesting suggestions. Hopefully somebody up there takes a look at it (although how much do you want to bet you'll get a response like "our focus is on ORD-Downtown express, any other projects are outside of our scope" since, after all, why would we ever engage in regional planning?)

Emathias, given the fact that they are seeking private capital from an entity outside of the United States who simply may not understand Chicago's mass transit needs, have you considered a way to present your proposal so that 1. Private investment towards a ORD-Downtown terminus can begin first and thus yield revenue, and 2. The latter portions (downtown circulator) that involve more public money can be phased in over time?

Finally, why is Daley forming a committee for a long term project 1 month before he leaves office? The future of this project is really up to Rahmbo at this point.

The Humboldt Park, and Logan Square Met routes operated in the
same N/S alignment North of Lake St. up to Milwaukee Ave., as the remaining Paulina Connector (Pink Line) South of Lake St.

The old 'L' bridge over the UP West ROW remains as a UP signal support; but there has been much construction over the rest of the old Met 'L' ROW since.

Google Earth: 1700 W. Lake St., Chicago and you can follow the old Met 'L' ROW North to Milwaukee Ave., and see all the new construction: http://www.google.com/maps?source=ud...e+St.,+Chicago

I'm sorry I didn't add "as it currently exists" to my sentence. I'm well aware of the history, however that's all it is today - history.

I think that's open to debate, particularly since nearly half the line's mileage is non-productive replication of other services.

There is another issue where more frequent than necessary service gets ran on the Forest Park branch of the blue line. If you live along this line, I imagine it's rather nice, but I don't think the ridership is there to justify that service level. I suspect the old configuration of a Douglas and Forest Park branch of the Blue Line was a more efficient system.

Yeah, but the CTA short-turns trains after UIC-Halsted, so the Forest Park branch has half the frequency of the subway and O'Hare branch. Previously, they just ran every other train to the Douglas branch.

I think there are only around 6-7 daily short turns at Morgan Middle Track --- it's definitely not every other train.

Looking at the Blue Line schedule, it seems like, in addition to turning around at UIC-Halsted (only five trains according to the schedule), some trains seem to be held in Desplaines Yard after running south from O’Hare and through downtown during rush hour, so inbound frequencies are in the 7-10 minute range, not the 3-4 minute range of the O’Hare Branch. This leads to kind of a weird situation where the reverse commute trains on the Forest Park line running at higher frequencies than the regular commute. So peak headway is little bit longer than on the Green Line’s Lake Branch (6 min, IIRC), and both have around the same ridership (~27,000 weekday boardings on non-downtown stations), so I don’t think the line’s inbound frequency is too high.

Upgrading the interlocking and third track behind UIC-Halsted was proposed in the late nineties as part of the Schaumburg extension of the Blue Line—O’Hare trains would continue to Forest Park and Cermak, whereas the new Schaumburg service would end at UIC-Halsted. I don’t see any reason (besides money, of course) why they couldn’t do this now—it could also help boost frequencies for reverse commuters on the O’Hare branch, who definitely are a larger market.

I'd prefer if they relocated the holding track to west of the Medical Center station. With 900k boardings in 2010, it has more traffic than Clinton or LaSalle, but much more than stations further west. Plus, it would allow for a high frequency of service to a major employment center (in 2010, Medical Center captured more riders than Polk, despite a less-convenient location).

CTA has a massive four-track right of way, with extra room for station platforms, so they can put the holding track anywhere, and construction is a breeze.