Some early Christmas gifts from CTA:
CTA starting work (finally) on rehabbing the Congress branch:
https://www.transitchicago.com/cta-a...egoryId=2&pg=2
$105M to rebuild the tracks between UIC-Halsted and Medical District, plus an upgrade project to the Racine station including an elevator for accessibility. i'm glad they're finally starting, but it's annoying they are piecemealing this instead of just knocking it out like CTA did for the Dan Ryan branch 10 years ago.
CTA gets $118M for accessibility improvements:
https://www.chicagobusiness.com/poli...pete-buttigieg
Unfortunately because of our batshit construction costs, the money won't go very far - possibly only 2 stations, Belmont and Irving Park on the Blue Line. The article references Pulaski, but I can't tell if they are referring to the Pulaski
entrance at Irving Park, or the Pulaski station on the Congress branch. CTA's official press release does claim it is "
three stations", fwiw, but that's still an average of $40M per station. (A brand new station only costs $80M at Damen Green Line.) Both Irving Park and Belmont saw major work recently, now they have to go back and rip up those stations again to add elevators. Just insane the way they do things.
Chicago Ave bus lanes now permanent
https://chi.streetsblog.org/2022/12/09/bus-lanes/
During Covid, CDOT painted some janky "bus lanes" on Chicago Ave from Ashland to Western. The signage was poor, no red paint was used, and the restrictions were rush hour only. Drivers totally ignored them. Now the city has finally added the red paint along the full mile from Ashland to Western and made the bus lane 24/7 instead of rush hour only. I'm sure drivers will still cheat, but now it will just be the assholes instead of just normal drivers that are confused.