Just read it on my juice blast. Great news indeed!

I'm excited but waiting for more details here.

The SCAL bridge is the keystone of the CrossRail plan, but I'm waiting for an official statement on how Metra/Amtrak plan to use the bridge. I think the plan initially is to fix the reverse move on New Orleans and Carbondale trains.

In the medium term they also want to shift St Louis and San Antonio trains onto the Rock Island, so those trains will use this connection also. Long-term, they may route Michigan and East Coast trains this way, but that requires other new connections on the South Side and Indiana.

No idea what plans, if any, Metra has for the corridor. The SCAL is operationally separate from Metra Electric with no connections until you get down to Kensington. Further investments would be needed to really do CrossRail, including track connections between SCAL/ME and new McCormick platforms.

This is my first time hearing about a direct line from O'Hare to downtown on Metra. Would it just be one stop at McCormick? Seems like there should be a stop at Union Station, no?

The CrossRail plan was developed by advocates (Midwest HSR Association), not by Metra or Amtrak and is currently not official in any way, although CMAP did put in on their unconstrained project list (read: wish list). Under CrossRail, Metra Electric trains would go from University Park to O'Hare with major stops at McCormick and Union Station and lots of other local stops.

https://hsrail.org/sites/default/fil...e%20rgs-01.png
https://hsrail.org/midwest/crossrail-chicago

The construction of a bridge on the St Charles Air Line does not mean that Metra is ready to embrace CrossRail - it seems like (for now) this is an Amtrak-led project that will primarily benefit intercity trains. Right now the trains to St Louis can go fast through the open country, but once they hit Joliet they have to crawl up a congested freight line through the SW burbs to get into the city. Building the SCAL bridge will allow the St Louis trains to switch to Metra's Rock Island line to get through the burbs instead, which should allow faster and more reliable service to St Louis.

It would also cut maybe 10 minutes off the trip time for Amtrak trains to Champaign/Carbondale and New Orleans, which don't use the Rock Island line but they do have to make the railroad equivalent of a slow 3-point turn to get into Union Station.

Now that I have looked more into this.... Amazing. For sure, a direct fast line from O'Hare to the city with a stop at Union Station would be phenomenal. I would love to see something like Union Station in Denver where it's not just a train stop, but a "living room" for people coming into the city. There's restaurants and comfy seating inside the facility. Wouldn't take much to put that in, but it could do wonders for first-timers coming into the city.

Freight trains still use that elevated rail section parallel to 16th Street don't they? Does a freight railroad own that corridor? If so, how does that impact these plans in terms of reliability and frequency if the corridor must be shared and schedules negotiated between passenger & freight trains?

The St Charles Air Line is owned by Canadian National and has about 6 freight trains per day. I don't think that will be too much of a hindrance to passenger service, but if it is, there is room to add a 2nd or 3rd track along 16th St and up to 2 additional tracks across the river on the old B&OCT bridge (the one that is currently locked in the 'up' position).

I'm always so annoyed they didn't flip the new rental car facility at O'hare and put the ATS on the east side of it instead of the west side. You could literally have the ATS and Metra station consolidated together to transfer people.

As it is now extend that ATS up another 1,000 feet with a station over Higgens. Have an exit on the south side tied into the Sheraton and Holiday Inn and then rip down that crap on the north side and put in a large master planned hotel/convention, etc complex directly tied into the ATS. Willow Creek runs right through the middle of it, redevelop that as a functional water feature right through the middle.

This is awesome news! Untangling the Amtrak mess south of Union would be a dream come true. The talk has been going on forever. Hopefully the funds come through and shovels hit dirt on this finally.

Express trains to O'Hare are badly needed and would be a huge boost to the city as well. Attempting to do it on the Blue Line was never the right approach (thanks, Daley) since you would need to at the very least triple track the entire Blue Line, which would be either prohibitively expensive or downright impossible to do on the elevated structure and subway tunnels. Whereas using existing rail networks and having Metra operate it is much more feasible since the line and existing station (O'Hare Transfer) exist.

Much to MayorOfChicago's point, it is silly that you need to lug your suitcases across 1000 ft of parking lot to go from the O'Hare ATS to the Metra station. I wonder how much more it would cost to simply dig a tunnel and have a Metra stop directly underneath O'Hare, ala the Blue Line? It would be a huge timesaver and be much more convenient to ride only one train downtown, instead of having to transfer from the ATS. Alas, almost 100% unlikely to happen anytime in the near future. I will gladly settle for express runs to O'Hare Transfer from Union, if we are lucky enough to get that :)

Yeah, that's one thing I don't like about the ATS.... Is how it's a bit inconvenient. I tried it for the first time last month. It was very nice, clean, etc. But..... knowing how to get from T5 to the Blue Line was a bit of a puzzle for someone who isn't a long running O'Hare vet. It would be nice of the transit options were a bit better integrated. But I also understand there are legacy systems and costs.

This news is great though. Chicago is lucky in that is has a solid rail network in place because of its history. It can easily tap into that and put in a system without having to shovel billions for any new tracks. So many other cities don't have that convenience, and it will cost them so much more to build out new lines in the future.

I've always wondered how feasible it is for Metra to directly access O'Hare by connecting to the Blue Line tunnels with a flyover. Sections of Tokyo and London tracks allow mixing of subway and suburban rail services, so it's not unprecedented. I guess the question would then be, does the Blue Line tunnel have enough clearance for bilevel Metra trains + overhead rail? If not, would it be cheaper to retrofit the tunnels & build a flyover instead of constructing a new Metra tunnel from scratch?

Not remotely, plus FRA is not going to allow railroad equipment anywhere close to rapid transit tracks.

Personally, I've wondered if it might be easier to bring O'Hare Metra service in from Bensenville Yard on Milw-W, tunneling under the runways south of the current terminal, rather than sticking with the NCS that stops way over at the rental car center. Milw-W is under Metra control, while NCS is always at the mercy of CP.

My crayon:

https://i.imgur.com/gu48htU.jpg

The ATS could be branched along O'Hare Way/Balmoral Ave to connect to the Metra at the Rosemont station. Could be integrated into a development and would probably shave 5-10 mins off of the trip compared to the rental car facility stop.

The Metra O'Hare connection as it stands is basically pointless unless you fly into T5. There is just no time savings or convenience to be gained by taking the ATS to Metra vs the short walk to the Blue Line. At T5 you have to take the ATS either way so it could make sense but then you have to worry about waiting around forever since the trains are infrequent.

Any public money spent trying to improve the Metra connection should instead be spent improving the Blue Line, IMO.

I take the Blue Line to/from O'Hare at least 4x a month from downtown.

Link the brown to blue and when they redo the highway triple track that all the way out to ohare from where it connects to the brown.

I tend to agree. An "express train" to the remote lot is not an express train compared to the Blue Line that already exists.

If the city was really serious about an O'Hare Express, they would include another 2 trackways for mainline rail in the median of I-190 when they reconstruct it in a few years. That's gotta be cheaper than a new tunnel, and you can use highway funds to pay for most of the work.

How would people feel if the Blue Line was cut back to a Miami-style intermodal center near Mannheim with an ATS transfer, and the new O'Hare Express took over the last mile of Blue Line tracks into the terminal complex?

https://i.ibb.co/WHbfP6D/ordrail.jpg

I feel that plan screws over locals (and the thousands of O'Hare employees that take transit to work) in favor of out of town business travelers. Or at the least, that's how critics will sell it and it will be dead in the water.

You other plan of adding 2 more tracks to the I-90 median that connects the NCS line to the Blue line O'Hare subway station would be the best solution, and while the median trackage could be fairly easy, tunneling to the station and then expanding said station will be very costly. The flyover trackage connecting the I-90 median tracks with the NCS line wouldn't be a walk in the park either. In my opinion, these would be funds well spent. But not sure if our elected leaders would agree. Hopefully someone behind the scenes is working on getting funds from the Biden Infrastructure plan for something like this though.

O'Hare employees are scattered all over the airfield though, they're less likely to be heading to T1/T2/T3 than the average traveler. To me a remote Blue Line terminal is more convenient for them. But I guess any workers that aren't in the terminals are driving to work?

I don't think you actually need to tunnel the last 1/2 mile and terminal station if you're willing to lose some of the surface parking. The O'Hare Express terminal could be at-grade in Lot B.

A lot of the check-in sites for airport work are on Touhy Ave.

My relative for a deicing job takes the Blue Line—>ATS to car rental—>walk or carpool

A substantial amount of time was spent in the last CTA board meeting debating why they insist on painting so many station structures white when it leads to unsightly rust streaks within a year of being applied. Honestly, probably a fair question.

^ Stats also from the June board meeting. CTA's April ridership was 19.8 million passengers. This is 50% of April 2019, so the CTA still has a ways to go. Also, the entire Forest Park branch is now basically one giant slow-zone

Not sure how they can avoid repainting... just let the steel rust?

Newer stations and structures have metallized/galvanized coatings (dull gray) especially in areas exposed to salt, but that's not realistic for the hundreds of older stations that CTA has.

I don't mind a little bit of rust as long as it doesn't lead to deterioration. CTA should probably establish a regular cycle of touchups and repainting for steel components, like IDOT does. Maybe 8 years for touchups and 16 years for strip/repaint? Some stations (expressway or adjacent) will need more frequent repainting than others.

Also, it seems like everyone on CTA staff could use a primer on galvanic issues. I've seen several times where steel and aluminum, or steel and stainless, are in direct contact. Add winter salt to that mix and now you've got a serious rust problem that could easily be avoided.

Trains helps to flesh out the entire proposal and hangs some price tags on it. The entire article can be found here - https://www.trains.com/trn/news-revi...go-operations/

A single track Air Line Connector seems like a major chokepoint waiting to happen. They expect to pin airport-to-McCormick service, plus Amtrak East Coast, Michigan Service, Illini/Saluki, CONO, Cardinal, potential CHI-IND-Cincy/Louisville routes, Lincoln Service and Texas Eagle, plus future Metra RER-type service all on a single track connector?

ETA - There's also no mention whether the eastern approach to the Air Line Connector will fly over the Rock Island tracks or cross them at grade. Others here have greater knowledge of such things, but $146 million seems an awfully low figure for a combination connector and flyover, no? If trains cross at grade, you'll have another serious source of delays, even more so whenever Southwest Service trains terminate at LaSalle Street Station.

I also found this a curious line. I'd like to hear more about this idea - Regarding the Air Line Connector, I located a draft of the connector used by Amtrak for a feasibility study, dated April 15, 2020. It's from a presentation made by an Amtrak rep to the Midwest Intercity Passenger Rail Commission. It's as clear a copy as I could find. https://i.imgur.com/CeivHpV.jpg

The text that accompanies the graphic is as follows-
• Feasibility study draft done, showing structure is feasible
• Remaining key issue is impact on yard operations during construction and thereafter, particularly storage space
• Amtrak examining alternatives in Chicago area for make-up storage space

The single track would have all the existing Amtrak services, but not ORD-to-McCormick or Metra. Any expansion of regional or commuter service will require a 2nd track and maybe a new river bridge.

Note the bit about Amtrak purchasing UP's Canal St Yard near Chinatown - long-term, they can relocate some yard functions there to open up more space for a proper 2-track connection.

No flyover at 16th St Junction, it will remain a flat junction but will be upgraded with new alignments and wider turn radius for faster speeds. This requires new overpass locations at Clark St and maybe modifications to the Wells-Wentworth road project that's nearing completion. Not to mention that Related wants to build a Red Line subway station directly underneath 16th St Junction for The 78.

https://i.ibb.co/NWQCDGW/16th-st.jpg

The mail platforms were originally accessed thru the Old Post Office, but that access is now closed due to the redevelopment of the OPO. There is a sub-basement corridor that runs from the Union Station concourse to the mail platforms as well, but it probably does not meet modern fire codes to handle large crowds and a upgrade would be extremely costly.

^The subway station location would be about 400 feet north of any of this.

Not according to the last publicly released drawing.

https://s3-prod.chicagobusiness.com/...57.45%20PM.png
Crain's

Metra has been receiving more infrastructure funding than they originally budgeted. They're now able to fund several station renovations and yard expansions, as well as start sooner on plans for triple tracking the RID and rerouting the SWS. No mention of electrification unfortunately, but Metra is still pursuing zero-emission trainsets

https://metra.com/sites/default/file...t%20June_0.pdf

I must say, I was pleasantly surprised to hear this news...

Chicago’s Protected Bike Lanes Will Get Concrete Barriers By End Of 2023, City Says

"The city will add concrete barriers to 15 miles of bike lanes by the end of 2022 and make the same upgrades to another 13 miles by the end of 2023, said Erica Schroeder, spokesperson for the Chicago Department of Transportation. Those 28 miles of bike lanes currently have bollard or delineators separating them from the roadway, Schroeder said.

The city also will add another 10 miles of new protected bike lanes this year, totaling 45 miles of lanes throughout the city with either a concrete barrier, bollard or delineator, Schroeder said."

Excellent, though wish Dearborn was on the early list!

Yeah well the city has a rather long history of overpromising on this front so we'll see.

So - I think the city has officially begun working on this....

I was walking from Clark/Lake to WeWork this morning and saw yellow barriers with fresh paint on Wacker between Clark/Dearborn (I think?). Not sure how I feel about the look about the yellow barriers though. In any event, definitely reflects this effort from what I can tell.

I believe the yellow jersey barriers on Wacker are part of temporary bike lane detour while the Dearborn bridge is under construction, and were put up before the announcement about adding concrete to all protected bike lanes.

You should not expect the concrete protections elsewhere to look like that.

From what I understand the concrete barriers are basically going to be similar to the ones in parking lots that are anchored into the ground.

Oh thank god.....

I was worried that was going to be how the city was going to implement all of this. It looks tacky..... Thanks for clarifying!

fyi:
APTA first quarter ridership report for major systems was posted recently. Ridership will show sizable increases compared to height of COVID. Digging through the archive provides a sense of longer-term trends.

https://www.apta.com/research-techni...ership-report/

I noticed a new el line track or something (?) near Wrigley field yesterday. What the hell is that?

The Red Line is being reconstructed

https://www.transitchicago.com/asset...tion_FINAL.png

https://www.transitchicago.com/asset..._Map_(002).jpg
https://www.transitchicago.com/rpm/

Chicago Union Station upgrades

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FXEou3eW...pg&name=medium
source

A $418 million price tag to implement new flyovers, through-running, and purchase freight tracks is surprisingly cheap. If trains from the East Coast are using the South Shore Line tracks, it might justify reopening South Bend's Union Station as well.

This is wildly overstating what the grant will fund.

-1 new single-track ramp from the St Charles Air Line into Union Station
-refurbishment of 4 Union Station mail platforms for Amtrak
-rebuild of 16th St Junction
-new Amtrak platform at Joliet on the Rock Island tracks
-purchase of UP's Canal St Yard in Chinatown
-a few miles of double-track along the Wolverine in Michigan

That's it. No through-running, no purchase of freight tracks from CN. Those will require hundred of millions more. Even the Amtrak connection to the South Shore in Indiana is not funded yet. As for South Bend, that's a whole separate thing.

Ah gotcha, Metra CEO's said in a press release that this would be opportunity to consider through-running, so I assumed that was folded into this grant.

Press release: https://www.durbin.senate.gov/newsro...access-project

There are so many corridors in the southside that could be like 53rd st in HP, 18th st in Pilsen, Clark in Wrigleyville, etc. but the leadership is simply not there. The alderman in these neighborhoods are content with failing schools, rampant crime, car centric development, and any type of progression. There are parts of the southside that look the same as it did in the 70s and 80s. sad

One of the quickest ways to attract investment to a neighborhood is by making it more walkable and transit friendly. The red line extension should be coming, but they arent gonna start on that until 2025 which is a joke. It's been months since Biden passed his trillion dollar infrasturcture bill, they should at the minimum have some workers down at the sites right now.

Because their voting constituents are car crazy, just as much as the other bungalow neighborhoods and suburbs.

The nostalgia for post-war Englewood would have been the nice cars and department stores. Not the apartments or CTA.

A lot of my neighbors in South Chicago view taking the Metra as an eccentric activity for young people with money. The kindergartners next door regularly ask why I don’t take the car.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/histo...jqa-story.html
https://www.chicagotribune.com/histo...jqa-story.html

The best answer to this is that Federal money is like a food court... CTA has had Red Line Extension waiting in the (very long/slow) New Starts line for many years, and now is getting close to the head of the line. They probably believe it's better to keep waiting in line rather than rush over to a different funding program where they might end up in the back of the line again.

That doesn't mean they aren't submitting other projects for the new pots of money, though! A few years ago, Dick Durbin created Core Capacity as a new pot of money... RPM on the North Side was the first project to be funded. Likewise in the Biden infra bill, Tammy Duckworth created ASAP for accessibility upgrades... I'm sure CTA will get a big chunk of that.

:haha:

Has the CTA even secured the property and entitlements needed for the Red Line extension? I honestly don't know...

Honestly wish the CTA would fire Dorval Carter and bring in a Scandinavian, Asian, or other European transit expert who actually know what they're doing. Or an Andy Byford type who is clearly passionate and wants to improve the system. I think I read most of the people in CTA management barely have any transit experience, pathetic. Has anybody ever seen Dorval Carter on a train?

If I was CEO, I would make it a requirement for every employee to have to use the system. We never see the mayor, the ceo, or any other higher up figures on the trains, no wonder they could care less about it

Expanding the Redline? Fix what you have now first. Clean it up and get the trains clean and safer and faster

Agree, but I'm guessing the monies are earmarked towards certain uses like infrastructure improvements or expansion. AFAIK, the issues about the headways are more to do with staff shortages than anything else and not really to do with the infrastructure itself.

Reasoning is recent with staffing shortages. This was an issue before too, though not as bad.

I know the money from the Feds is for expansion and such. I wish it could be applied to fixing what is current before expanding.