Streetcar hopefully being a longer vehicle on par with Toronto's new vehicles.

http://www.ttc.ca/images/About_the_T...ar_Test_1a.jpg

^ Actually a streetcar is probably the best idea provided we are trying to move beyond bus service.

Lets face it, nobody is going to pay for a subway, which I find ideal (too bad it can't be 1900 again, where there is no ADA accessiblity and we can import Irish laborers who work for a dime and hour ;) )

^Sandhogs made great money, that's why they were so willing to risk their lives, ethnicity aside.

No, we're not moving immense crowds. That's why a subway is silly for corridors that don't even support a bus route today. Better to have a Portland-size streetcar (or bus) come along every 8 minutes than a high-capacity vehicle every 15 minutes.

Well, I imagine the immense crowds would materialize eventually. If you are filling up the articulated buses (as certain routes in the city already do) there is nowhere to go but rail. I agree with your thrust about maxing out buses - that's why I'm excited for the new Loop BRT as a proof of concept.

For something that's supposed to be quick/easy/cheap, though, that BRT sure requires a lot of advance planning and utility work.

But the buses can operate on much tighter headways, having rubber tires for braking and being subject only to rules of the road. You can run a bus every 70 feet. Rapid transit and light rail must have signal blocks and enforced separation of hundreds of feet between trains. The only way to approach the capacity of buses is to make long trains.

Not sure what rules streetcars would have to follow if reintroduced to Chicago. There's no way for them to overcome the greater braking distance of steel-on-steel, though.

Plenty of streetcar systems operate on sight rules, just like a bus - little or no signaling required. That's part of the reason why they are cheaper than light rail. You might need some kind of rudimentary signaling at sharp corners or in constrained portions like lower Carroll St, but generally they are dumb systems completely reliant on driver judgment.

You're right that the braking is not so easy for streetcars, which is why low-speed collisions are fairly common on new systems until drivers adjust to the presence of rail vehicles.

Because due to a lack of a N-S line for much of the north side of the city the Green Line involves a transfer and only then does it serve the north end of the West Loop. For anything in the south West Loop there is still a lengthy walk.

........While on the discussion of West Loop transit, I know it has been talked about years ago but I forget the explanation. Is there are any kind of logistics or cost prohibitive reasons why a new Blue Line stop couldn't be had before the curve between Fulton and Canal under Milwaukee that would essentially connect with the Green Line/Olgoive?

Now with two major office towers going up less then a block away I think the time calls more then ever not to let the Blue Line bypass that area entirely. 20 years ago it didn't make too much sense to try to force a station there but now it seems like a no brainer.

It would be a cheaper alternative (I think) then digging south in order to finish the Blue Line loop under Clinton/Canal while really bringing essentially the same benefits.

Yes, it would be enormously expensive as all infill subway stations are. If built, it would have to be centered diagonally on the intersection of Fulton and Clinton, a long walk from the platforms at Ogilvie.

Now, the Dearborn Subway was designed to receive Lake Street trains via a new subway portal around Lake/Racine. If built, this new segment of subway under Lake would have included a station at Clinton to replace the elevated station.

Today, it doesn't make much sense to build this - the O'Hare Branch of the Blue Line is the city's second-busiest rail corridor. Sending Green Line trains into the subway with a new portal would just borrow slots from the Blue Line without any practical benefits.

http://www.chicago-l.org/plans/images/1943subways.jpg

How Chicago Spent $400M On a Subway Superstation to Nowhe
 

http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local...#ixzz3SdkeD2Ct

Imagine a scenario where you bury a lot of your hard earned money in the yard, and never see it again. Better yet, imagine giving that money to someone else, who buries it with promises of big returns which never happen. Farfetched?

You’ve already done it......

Imagine! A public works project that stalled for an entire decade.

http://i.imgur.com/wiUmBdl.png

Source: whole cloth

I hope one day they revive the superstation.

edit: Nevermind $1.5 billion to finish it.....ridiculous but hey already $400 million sunk. It's ashame how our city's leadership mismanaged our resources that something like that could even happen smh.

I got to see inside the super-station shell during a walk-through for the current B37 project. What a waste!

Here's an exciting proposal for the space, in keeping with the recreation theme of B37: Create the world's 1st urban indoor rifle range! A little sound deadening material, a security barrier, some dedicated parking, and pardon the pun, boom! It would be an instant money maker for the city!

How about a subterranean spa. Any natural hot springs down there?

It would be nice to at least finish out a Red-Blue transfer corridor, if possible, through the space. Get some use, any use, out of it.

The difference is there just wasn't the money to finish the Blue Line due to financial constraints. There was little question of the benefits of the plan or the end result.

The Blue Line Airport express working as intended without causing efficiency issues Blue Line trains or Express trains is something that was a real question even if the project was completed. Or so I thought.

Not to mention the likely and much cheaper alternative of running express trains on the NCS line.

The Airport Express was initiated from a trip by then Mayor Daley to some SE Asian city with an AE operation like that, he decided that Chicago MUST have one (pet project on a whim); so he assigned CTA Planners with the task (as IMPOSSIBLE as it was/is without Big Billions being spent) who BETTER come up with one or he would hire new CTA Planners who would -- and thus the coming of the Airport Express!


It would obviously be much better to run an express via the Railroads from CUS to O'Hare today (the North Central rail infrastructure already exists), but we apparently can't even get our merde together enough to do that right! Hell, Metra could run expresses starting tomorrow leaving 5 minutes before some CUS North Central departures.

btw: Congratulations to Chicago on winning a Mayoral runoff -- six weeks to hold their feet to the fire on Public Transit issues; I'm salivating like one of Pavlov's dogs already (South Lakefront Transit)

Airport service that ends at CUS does nothing to reinforce the center of the Loop, which was the intent of 40 years of North Loop redevelopment, and the very reason for the Block 37 project in the first place. We don't need any help convincing companies to move to the West Loop. We need help keeping them close to the subway lines, where people from all parts of the city—even the South Lakefront—have easy access.

^ Hence the need for better East-West rail connections downtown.

You seem to recognize the need for this in some round about fashion, but just won't go out and admit it.

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH.... A gun range in the middle of the Loop. That's hilarious. I would sooner hold my breath for the sun to swallow our planet whole. Why would we ever encourage people to bring their firearms all the way into the center of our city? That's a good one.

I'm all for bringing back street cars. Maybe we could use this space to assemble new streetcars. Have a manufacturing dead center in the city that works. They could start with first line going up Dearborn and continue up Clark to Wrigley like the fine folks at Chicago Streetcar Renaissance suggest (http://www.chicagostreetcar.com/). Just elevate the new cars to street level and put them right to use.