strictures

The Garfield Green Line parking is for commuters, but yes, there's no commuter parking at the Dan Ryan.

A NB 147 crashed into a tree at Lawrence, at 2:09 PM on Monday. The articles say the driver suffered a medical emergency. That causes me to bring up, that there a number of drivers, just from North Park alone who are in the 350-400 pound range. I don't ever recall CTA having drivers that are extremely morbidly obese until a few years ago. 4 Hurt in LSD bus crash

Then they need to assign 7-8 of them to the 155 during the day. That route is now a disaster, what with 25% of the riders with either a walker or shopping cart!

Crain's just posted a Greg Hinz column about the Metropolitan Planning Council & two other local groups that she should go along with cheaper South Side Metra fare, because the county has pledged to make up the difference in CTA losses. Lightfoot, Preckwinkle urged to work out transit dispute

While they kneel the bus,listen to the number of warning beeps when the bus is kneeled. Most do just two beeps, which means the bus isn't fully lowered, when in fact the bus will be fully lowed at about 6 beeps. If I board or alight at a terminal with no raised boarding areas, the bus should be fully lowered, they don't do it, even for a 70 year old like me! Plus kneeling should be mandatory when you have a combination of at least 5 people getting on or off at a stop. It will speed it up. And as for tilting the bus, it's rare, even on the 147 & 155, which are crowded with much older people, carrying shopping bags.

1. I'm not complaining about how fast they start up, I'm complaining about why the bus starts up with a jerk. Even on a slow start, it's a jerk! The Pace drivers don't do it, so why can't CTA drivers do it? 2. If there's any obstruction on the platform, then the motorman would see it as the train entered the station. CTA rules require them to be standing as they enter station, curves, turns & switches! 3. Automatic stopping has nothing to do with open doors. The 5000 train has stopped, then they walk across & open the window, look out & then open the doors. If the train is 1 minute late, you have 1 minute of extra people getting on, which creates another minute of delay.

Oh, good grief! The scheduling department, like most of the CTA is incompetent. I ride buses every day & from what I see, many drivers are responsible for the delays. Sure there are plenty of other reasons, but drivers who won't pass another bus, screw it up. Drivers who won't lower the bus all the time also make it lose time. There are at least half the drivers out of North Park, that simply won't lower the bus, even in the middle of the street, unless asked. Even then, they just barely lower it. They need to connect the kneeling mechanism to the door opener control so the bus always lowers, unless there's a reason not to, such as on the Loop Link platforms. I've also ridden a number of Pace buses lately & it's amazing, not one of them starts up with that hard jerk that almost every CTA driver manages to do. I was once knocked to the floor, even though I was holding on to a stanchion, that's how hard this driver started up from a standing start. He never even asked if I was OK! As for the L, there are two kinds of motormen, ones who open the doors as soon as they hit their stop mark & those who insist on opening the window & looking out & then opening the doors. Since all Red Line trains from morning through night are 8 cars, if they hit the 8 mark, they know all cars are on the platform. By waiting for the window to open & look out, adds at least 5 seconds per stop & that means a couple minutes behind schedule at midpoint in the run. That means extra people on the platform to load & that causes additional delays, which cascade down the system!

I would like the red LED display at the front to give the run number more often & also show how many minutes late the bus is. I think if that was done, the CTA might finally figure out there are problems that they refuse to fix. In the last few weeks, almost every 22 Clark has been running in pairs northbound, even when they don't have Cubs games or bridge openings.

Have you seen the new display for the drivers on the New Flyers? They tell the driver how many feet to the stops. What I don't like is the change from where it showed "Schld Late" or early with a number of minutes after it. The new display of + or - plus minutes is harder for passengers to read. I'll bet that was the reason for that change.

I'm guessing that any possible expansion is on hold until the RPM project on the North Side is completed. I'm against any expansion, until all of the existing system is brought up to modern standards. The CTA also needs to upgrade the Blue Line, both the trackage/roadbed & the power system. It's also why I'm opposed to the idiotic & unnecessary Peterson/Ridge station being built on the UP North Line, as the Rogers Park station is not only a dump, but the platforms are too short for the rush hour trains, there are so many people getting off in the afternoon rush, what with just two overburdened stairs, people are now using the ramp to go down, that's how dangerous the stairs are now. Plus there used to be a station there until about 1960, called Kenmore, with yet another, far fancier station 3 blocks south of there at Rosehill Cemetery, complete with an elevator, though for coffins, not people. The sole reason for the station is that ex-alderman Pat O'Connor's wife, has large real estate holdings in the area & he wanted it to make her more money. Incredibly, the new alderman, Andre Vasquez is also in favor of it, probably because he lives just a block away from it!

That wouldn't work. Obviously, you haven't ridden some CTA routes where there are at least a half dozen people using walkers. The 155 is one of them that always has old people with walkers.

Maybe they have polling results that show people want things to stay the same, such as the 215, Howard to Old Orchard.

I took the 40 a number of times. It even had its own gated entrance to the inbound Kennedy.

The 11 Lincoln used to go there. There used to be a 155A that went to Edgebrook. Few riders. A Yellow station at McCormick? Why? There's no people there & building it over the Sanitary District treatment plant would be difficult to impossible, as the SDC owns the property.

Exactly, where do you think Ventra is getting its CTA data? Why they're getting direct from the CTA!