OK, the Metro Paris is great, but El Chicago has 2 lines (Red and Blue lines) with a 24/7 service.

I have no pictures to show, but some of the steel at the Clark junction flyover has been painted a sage green color. It’s visible at School street. I think the old tracks on the north side were originally a similar green color seen in historic photos

Interesting. They repainted the Brown Line structure at Roscoe awhile back but it was more of a light gray.

The area around School St is supposed to be totally replaced, from the north end of the Belmont station structure up to the alley south of Cornelia. Weird that they would repaint it.

CTA cutting fares for passes: https://www.chicagobusiness.com/greg...oost-ridership

I did think the monthly pass was quite overpriced before (it really required using every weekday to be worthwhile).

It’s new steel track supports, slightly to the west, maybe 8-9’ out from the existing structure. I didn’t think the track straightening would shift to the west but I think it has to do with phased replacement, much like the strategy on freeway construction where they widen the shoulder for additional lanes while they remove existing.

I thought it was interesting too considering the roscoe section and Belmont station are a neutral gray or white. The green is really subtle but looks nice

Let's just be thankful its not that wretched hunter green they paint the el's in New York.

Yeah, temporary tracks are known as "shooflys" in railroad jargon.

I'm not sure if these are temporary though, if they were temporary I would just expect CTA to close the alley for a few months and throw up something quick. But the new track there looks permanent and they put in some complicated steelwork to straddle the alley. :shrug:

It looks like they're starting the cutover process for the new flyover as well, they will need to demolish part of the Belmont station deck from 2009 and slide in the ready-made, wider deck they've been building alongside the tracks.

Metra To Break Ground On Edgewater Station Next Week After Decade Of Planning
Joe Ward
4:28 PM CDT on Oct 26, 2021

Quote:

Most recently, work was slated to begin in May, but the Department of Water Management rejected Metra’s plans for environmentally friendly permeable pavers and green landscaping features. The problem is the ground beneath the station holds city water mains, and the city’s Department of Water Management was worried about groundwater from the station leaking into the water mains, Metra officials said this spring when announcing the delay. A new groundwater plan had to be submitted before work could move forward.

Quote:

The station will be as long as six train cars. Its Downtown-bound platform will have a warming shelter, including an enclosed waiting area and an additional warming station. The northbound platform will have a warming station as well, Metra officials said at a public meeting Monday. There will be 41 on-site parking spaces at the station, with the ability to add more spaces if needed. A pedestrian plaza will include a car turnaround for dropoffs and pickups. Metra had sought to build a station in Edgewater to help meet transit demand throughout the North Side. Prior to the pandemic, Metra estimated it would see 650 daily boardings at the station.

^ wow, and it only took a short little 12 FREAKING YEARS to finally get some shovels in the ground to build two relatively simple train platforms.


the snail's pace of transit infrastrucutre improvement in this country is utterly mind boggling at times.


anyone wanna place any bets on when that newly proposed west loop metra station might open?

i'm saying 2054, at the earliest.

The culture's gotta change. They don't seem to half a sense of urgency. Not one iota.

With the infrastructure bill passing and heading to Biden’s desk to be signed into law, I’m assuming the new State St station will now be happening. I wonder what other stuff could happen under the infrastructure bill. Another new CTA station somewhere? Will the Damen station on the Green Line finally be built? New stations for Metra?

If we're being honest, we need the scale of infrastructure investment in this country that funds new lines to new riders, not just a couple stations. We need a dependable stream of funding for infrastructure (remember the infrastructure bank?) issued on a yearly or bi-yearly basis. The U.S. needs to get real. This infrastructure bill is nothing to sneeze at, I will admit, but when put in context with the absolute deficit of investment in areas like transit and rail over the last 60 years, the scale of investment falls short in its ability to transform the country. While I get that the China comparison is unfair for a number of reasons, least of which their form of government and the fact they are experiencing rapid modernization like we experienced in the first couple decades of the last century, BUT it should not be disregarded just at what scale the Chinese are investing in their infrastructure. In a given year over the last decade, China allocates on average 5% of the total GDP for infrastructure. In 2020, that was 8 trillion! 8 trillion! Compare that to what we just passed (not to mention its a 10 year program!) and what on average is the United States yearly federal allocation for infrastructure: 0.52%


EDIT: According to official US data, China spent $8 trillion dollars on infrastructure programs in 2020, far exceding even their baseline 5%/GDP per year baseline. In the same time period, the U.S. spent $146 billion.

$4 billion for transit won't even be enough for RPM phase 2, let alone the other capital projects needed for CTA and Metra. I could see Metra applying for the $66 billion intercity rail grants to fund the A-2 flyover. Even then, the actual Fulton Market station will still cost $500 million.

You make a good point. We do need a dependable stream of infrastructure revenue. If the government can spend that much money on the military, surely we can spend quite a bit on infrastructure each year as well. Regardless, I am looking forward to seeing some new public transit projects that can now be funded, mainly the new State Street station.

Can someone explain how this bill isn't still massively underfunded? $39B investment for Chicago alone would get wheel chair accessibility and like two new CTA stations on existing lines... let alone that amount for the ENTIRE country. Seems like this is a drop in the bucket for what's actually needed to get our transit systems even into the 1990s.

^That's because it is. A 1 trillion/x? year funding bill for transit and rail alone is what is needed to modernize and expand existing transit networks as well as build a first-world rail network. Obviously thats not political tenable right now. And if the answer to "well when then?" is never, then I sincerely worry for the future.

Also important to remember is that a shit ton of the total for transit nationwide will go towards conversion of bus fleets to electric/zero emission. While this is undoubtedly important it's not exactly the subway tunnel/LRT line/transit center hard infrastructure that most think of when thinking about infrastructure. Something solid, something permanent, at least for decades that is. Something like a Brown Line extension or a Mid-City Transitway. Unfortunately Cta may very well actually recieve enough to move forward with Red Extension, as currently composed, a stupid project if one has ever been seen. As mentioned before the only Red extension that really makes sense is a Bishop Ford median extension to Stony Island, not this convoluted dogleg route they have been politically prodded to plan for.

insane how high transit costs are in the US. $500million-1 billion for a single station is outrageous. No wonder cities neglect their public transit.

Abandoning rail and transit in favor of an auto culture certainly contributed to building transit infrastructure being a foreign concept for all but a few advanced contractors with industry knowledge that drive up bid asks due to lack of competition.

Transit ridership is in the gutter right now thanks to our response to Covid.

Private transportation is the future, so the only money going to transit right now should be to repair what is in bad shape.

I think we need to spend more money on fixing all of Chicago’s potholed streets as well as more bike lanes.