Damn, dude, you just have nothing positive to say about any transit improvements than your lifelong pet project...

The whole idea here is to create a district. The new L stop will service this district, not just McCormick Place. It's like saying that nobody uses the Red Line to visit the Mag Mile because it is 3 blocks away. Not true

Harry. . . if you're shopping for datacenters, PM me. . .

. . .

DePaul is at the Fullerton stop, so brown to green or red to green.

I think that there are a lot of truly needed projects in the Chicago area, that are not Pork, and/or Corporate Welfare.

Connecting the Brown Line from Kimball to Jefferson Park should be a top city priority, and running Brown Line trains all the way to O'Hare. Implementing the CrossRail Project: http://www.midwesthsr.org/crossrail-chicago and connecting McCormick Place to CUS via the St.Charles Airline, and CUS directly to O'Hare (Metra). Connecting O'Hare directly to Midway by Rail (Metra). Extending the Orange Line to Ford City. The Mid-City Crosstown Transit ("L") Line. Some type of Circulator Service downtown.

I keep pushing my pet project because nobody else seems to be watching out for that part of the city (other than to try to find a way to make Millions (Billions?) OFF OF them, with little or no benefits TO them).

I never got the rationale for supporting this idea. Who is traveling between the two airports? And it's not like there's a ton of residential density along that route to support it...

Depends on what the alignment is. If we're talking about a frequent rail service along the Belt Railway corridor (every 15min or less), then it could definitely work. We're talking about a fairly dense corridor with the potential to redevelop industrial sites that are not protected by PMD zoning in most cases.

If we're talking about a Metra-style hourly train along the Indiana Harbor Belt (the so-called "Inner Circumferential Line") then it is a massive waste of money. It would sit beyond the reach of every single L line, so the only transfers would be with other Metra lines and nobody will sit for 30 minutes at some lonely rail junction in the middle of an industrial park to change trains - trip times would easily be 3x or 4x longer than driving.

The Belt Railway alignment (4600 West) is the Mid-City Transit Line; I did mean the Harbor Belt, but not to connect with any other CTA or Metra lines -- strictly High-speed Limited-stop Airport to Airport (The service would greatly expand flight connection options, and I think it would attract lots of ridership -- but only after coming into operation with advertising and promotion).

This! I rarely if ever use Midway, prices are even usually cheaper at O'hare.

Nobody is going to fly to 1 airport , train it over to another and then fly from there. I used to fly EVERY week for work and i never did that , and never would. People will always try nonstop or have a connecting flight in a different city than leave the airport for what you are proposing.

Nobody would use a MDW-ORD link. Who in their right mind would fly into one airport, exit security, take a train to another airport, and go back through security when they could simply catch a connecting flight on the same airline at the same airport they flew into?

employees, whom may live in one area, and work in the other.

truckers, (crosstown exp) whom may deliver services to both airports. . .

etc.. . .

^ Seems like this line should be at the very tippy bottom of any transit wish list. Such a waste of money.

OK -- What about CrossRail, and connecting the McCormick Place/DePaul/Lucas area to CUS; and connecting CUS to O'Hare?

That's really reaching. Certainly not sufficient to justify the enormous expense that would be incurred.

chill out! it's dead already. a lot of members on this board may not know that the crosstown project had begun on the southern end (land acquisitions). it would have included an expressway and median transit component. . .therefore, it was certainly thought to be "justified" in that era-- the late sixties. it was ultimately defeated politically.

i posted earlier: byrne/thompson killed the whole project. some of the funds were utilized on the orange line project and improvements at o'hare (i believe)

Crossrail should probably be built in it's entirety.

Another reason for my Rabid pursuit of that project is that we all read about Chatham, South Shore, Grand Crossing, Roseland, East 79th St., and Woodlawn each and every single day -- don't we??

The direct reason for that is that there are NO Jobs or current Economic Development in those areas, leading directly to crime, violence, and Teachers getting shot through walls: http://www.myfoxchicago.com/story/25...rt-in-shooting

Crain's pictured it like this (which I knew all along from living there for 58 years): http://www.chicagobusiness.com/artic...income-levels#

If anyone is aware of someone/anyone doing something/anything to change all those red dots to some other happier color, please post it here:




And I would really like to hear some comments on that Crain's article, is it valid? And if it is -- what can be done about the situation (besides silly me tilting at windmills).

^ Still don't get your point. There are plenty of impoverished areas of Chicago that do have rapid transit service, but it hasn't done anything to turn things around.

Just because you have a train that takes you downtown doesn't mean your whole neighborhood is going to see economic development. You have to have skills, education, and a hard work ethic. It's not going to come raining down on you...

Cermak/McCormick - Green Line
 

9/7

Thanks for adding this to your rotation, Harry! I don't get down there very often.