More Bus Moves

[andrethebusman]

Chicago getting artics for 20,53,54. Kedzie artics on 12,151 only, North Park artics on 147,151 only, 103rd artics on 6,14,71,192. 147,151 artics on all-day trains only. 9 and 63 will have RAD extras as 74th can't handle artics.

LaSalle and Sheridan severe headway increases, otherwise only minor headway changes, no hours changes.

[artthouwill]

30 minutes ago, andrethebusman said:

Chicago getting artics for 20,53,54. Kedzie artics on 12,151 only, North Park artics on 147,151 only, 103rd artics on 6,14,71,192. 147,151 artics on all-day trains only. 9 and 63 will have RAD extras as 74th can't handle artics.

LaSalle and Sheridan severe headway increases, otherwise only minor headway changes, no hours 

 

[Shannoncvpi]

On 5/20/2020 at 9:13 PM, Shannoncvpi said:

I drove pass it yesterday & today

 

6 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

#1800 is on Route 9 at the moment

Guess NP helping out with the 9 of they sent it to 6

[NewFlyerMCI]

14 hours ago, andrethebusman said:

Chicago getting artics for 20,53,54. Kedzie artics on 12,151 only, North Park artics on 147,151 only, 103rd artics on 6,14,71,192. 147,151 artics on all-day trains only. 9 and 63 will have RAD extras as 74th can't handle artics.

LaSalle and Sheridan severe headway increases, otherwise only minor headway changes, no hours changes.

Surprised the 146 isn’t included as well. Also surprised that the 54 warrants this level of service, but I’m never over west, so that’s probably why. Also surprised at the 71, they haven’t even been using artics recently. Those will probably be the ones normally used on the 26

All-day trains? RAD?

[Shannoncvpi]

1 hour ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Surprised the 146 isn’t included as well. Also surprised that the 54 warrants this level of service, but I’m never over west, so that’s probably why. Also surprised at the 71, they haven’t even been using artics recently. Those will probably be the ones normally used on the 26

All-day trains? RAD?

Yea the 54 can get heavy af at times 

[BusHunter]

Surprised to hear #22 is losing artics. That route has pretty good ridership. So hopefully they are  adding service or that route will be fubar. Once everything opens up they may have to modify this pick. #146 without artics will be a joke at normal service levels. 

With the street closures for the open streets, theres going to be a few problems. One of the biggest will be the Broadway closure between Belmont and diversey. I think that whole area around belmont and halsted will get heavily gridlocked. Belmont is backed up now west of broadway. The #36s will be late, the #77s will be a disaster and the #22s with no artics will be close behind. Anything that goes to belmont and halsted like the #156 will be affected too. The riders are smart up north I see them flocking to marine drive and downtown or along lincoln park they will ride the #22. But then again 26th street is going to be an interesting closure also. 

[Anthony Devera]

20 minutes ago, BusHunter said:

Surprised to hear #22 is losing artics. That route has pretty good ridership. So hopefully they are  adding service or that route will be fubar. Once everything opens up they may have to modify this pick. #146 without artics will be a joke at normal service levels. 

With the street closures for the open streets, theres going to be a few problems. One of the biggest will be the Broadway closure between Belmont and diversey. I think that whole area around belmont and halsted will get heavily gridlocked. Belmont is backed up now west of broadway. The #36s will be late, the #77s will be a disaster and the #22s with no artics will be close behind. Anything that goes to belmont and halsted like the #156 will be affected too. The riders are smart up north I see them flocking to marine drive and downtown or along lincoln park they will ride the #22. But then again 26th street is going to be an interesting closure also. 

I'm not sure why the 20, 53, and 54 are more of a priority for artics than the 22 and 146. But to be fair, it will take a while for ridership levels to return to the way they were before the pandemic, and it's possible that the 20, 53, and 54 didn't see as significant of a ridership drop during the lockdown, so they're more likely to be crowded once everything opens up again. Since there are about 100 surplus artics, does this mean all of them will be utilized now? I'm assuming not, considering artics are being taken off of the 22 and 146 (if I understand correctly).

What I think should happen is that the in-service artics remain on the routes they were on before, and the surplus artics are split somehow between Chicago (20, 53, 54, 66, 72, 74) and 77th (2, 3, 4, 79, 87). Or some of those artics could be put in service at NP (36, 155). Yes, I know dwell time was a problem before, but I feel like now there should be different priorities. I'm wondering how some transit systems (such as Seattle) are able to successfully run artics on local routes, but Chicago seems to have trouble with it, and if Chicago could somehow learn from those transit systems.

[orionbuslover]

5 hours ago, BusHunter said:

Once everything opens up they may have to modify this pick.

Illinois has moved into a new phase of reopening and Chicago will join in a few days, but things are far from being back to normal. All the major summer events have been cancelled, sports aren't coming back anytime soon, and even more importantly working parents have to figure out childcare with camps and summer programs severely limited or cancelled. Schools were first to close during this pandemic and will probably be the last to fully reopen. Until they do fully reopen, employers will have to allow for telework options or working parents will have a fit. Childless workers will benefit from that as well.

4 hours ago, Anthony Devera said:

Since there are about 100 surplus artics, does this mean all of them will be utilized now?

 

4 hours ago, Anthony Devera said:

What I think should happen is that the in-service artics remain on the routes they were on before, and the surplus artics are split somehow between Chicago (20, 53, 54, 66, 72, 74) and 77th (2, 3, 4, 79, 87). Or some of those artics could be put in service at NP (36, 155). 

A surplus of artics has only ever been established on this forum. Realistically, I don't see a reason for CTA to view the D60LFR's as a special group of surplus buses. They have however many hundreds of artics in total and they aren't needed on their normal assignments as much as they are needed in heavily transit dependent communities. Moving the artics around is something tangible the CTA can highlight when asked what they've been doing to improve conditions during this pandemic.

[Sam92]

1 hour ago, orionbuslover said:

Illinois has moved into a new phase of reopening and Chicago will join in a few days, but things are far from being back to normal. All the major summer events have been cancelled, sports aren't coming back anytime soon, and even more importantly working parents have to figure out childcare with camps and summer programs severely limited or cancelled. Schools were first to close during this pandemic and will probably be the last to fully reopen. Until they do fully reopen, employers will have to allow for telework options or working parents will have a fit. Childless workers will benefit from that as well.

 

A surplus of artics has only ever been established on this forum. Realistically, I don't see a reason for CTA to view the D60LFR's as a special group of surplus buses. They have however many hundreds of artics in total and they aren't needed on their normal assignments as much as they are needed in heavily transit dependent communities. Moving the artics around is something tangible the CTA can highlight when asked what they've been doing to improve conditions during this pandemic.

It's not specifically D60LFRs counted as surplus it's anything over the 208 artics we had prior to 2013. 

[Sam92]

5 hours ago, Anthony Devera said:

I'm not sure why the 20, 53, and 54 are more of a priority for artics than the 22 and 146. But to be fair, it will take a while for ridership levels to return to the way they were before the pandemic, and it's possible that the 20, 53, and 54 didn't see as significant of a ridership drop during the lockdown, so they're more likely to be crowded once everything opens up again. Since there are about 100 surplus artics, does this mean all of them will be utilized now? I'm assuming not, considering artics are being taken off of the 22 and 146 (if I understand correctly).

What I think should happen is that the in-service artics remain on the routes they were on before, and the surplus artics are split somehow between Chicago (20, 53, 54, 66, 72, 74) and 77th (2, 3, 4, 79, 87). Or some of those artics could be put in service at NP (36, 155). Yes, I know dwell time was a problem before, but I feel like now there should be different priorities. I'm wondering how some transit systems (such as Seattle) are able to successfully run artics on local routes, but Chicago seems to have trouble with it, and if Chicago could somehow learn from those transit systems.

Seattle is a case similar to Chicago In which they assumed a bigger bus automatically handles crowds instead of more aggressive schedule keeping 

[orionbuslover]

9 minutes ago, Sam92 said:

Seattle is a case similar to Chicago In which they assumed a bigger bus automatically handles crowds instead of more aggressive schedule keeping

Seattle's public transit system exclusively consisted of buses until this last decade. I would say a lot of artics are a must in a growing city that had no form of rail transit. With no rail system, KCM is/was notorious for it's long suburban milk runs that provide peak direction service to/from downtown. Those types of routes are ideal for artics. Chicago, Pittsburgh, NYC, Minneapolis, and smaller cities mostly use their artics on limitied/express routes that serve the core. NYC can get away with artics on local routes because of its size and sheer demand. 

[jajuan]

1 hour ago, orionbuslover said:

Illinois has moved into a new phase of reopening and Chicago will join in a few days, but things are far from being back to normal. All the major summer events have been cancelled, sports aren't coming back anytime soon, and even more importantly working parents have to figure out childcare with camps and summer programs severely limited or cancelled. Schools were first to close during this pandemic and will probably be the last to fully reopen. Until they do fully reopen, employers will have to allow for telework options or working parents will have a fit. Childless workers will benefit from that as well.

 

A surplus of artics has only ever been established on this forum. Realistically, I don't see a reason for CTA to view the D60LFR's as a special group of surplus buses. They have however many hundreds of artics in total and they aren't needed on their normal assignments as much as they are needed in heavily transit dependent communities. Moving the artics around is something tangible the CTA can highlight when asked what they've been doing to improve conditions during this pandemic.

When 100 artics sit parked daily even during rush hour when service levels are normal, that's a surplus. 

[jajuan]

Also. Don't forget that even though service levels still won't be anywhere close to normal, artic deployments are also planned on what's been observed as heavier used routes during these odd times, as a means to help with social distancing on the buses of those routes. Buses haven't been jammed to the gills, but it also hasn't been as easy to practice recommended social distancing on standard size buses on these routes either. The 12 for instance has seen standard buses with close to all seats filled, while the 146 and 156 have seen their artics running with light enough loads these last couple of months that standard buses are more justified for the time being until things do go back close to what was normal before COVID-19 forced everything to shut down. From my occasional use of the 136, I can honestly say the same situation has been true for all three La Salle Express routes as well. The  lower passenger counts has made artic use on those overkill as well for now.

[orionbuslover]

3 minutes ago, jajuan said:

When 100 artics sit parked daily even during rush hour when service levels are normal, that's a surplus. 

How many 40 footers sit everyday even during rush hour? Is that a surplus? I lurked the surplus artic debate closely lol. Not trying to rehash that. The poster I replied to was applying this "surplus logic" to how CTA should divvy up artics. But I'm not convinced that CTA thinks they have a surplus of artics that allows them to keep normal artic assignments while also having artics on routes that don't normally have them but need them now to bolster social distancing standards. That's why some routes are losing artics, and others are winning them.

[jajuan]

34 minutes ago, orionbuslover said:

How many 40 footers sit everyday even during rush hour? Is that a surplus? I lurked the surplus artic debate closely lol. Not trying to rehash that. The poster I replied to was applying this "surplus logic" to how CTA should divvy up artics. But I'm not convinced that CTA thinks they have a surplus of artics that allows them to keep normal artic assignments while also having artics on routes that don't normally have them but need them now to bolster social distancing standards. That's why some routes are losing artics, and others are winning them.

You're trying to make an apples and oranges argument here. The spare ratio among the 40 footers was no where near as high as with the artics. The overall number of 40 footers parked vs what was on the street as a percentage just was not anywhere as near as high as that for the artics. And now we're seeing that the extra artics that are now on the street instead of sitting parked in the garage has effectively sidelined what remained of the 6400 series Novas because those buses don't have the security shields, which really have literally become sneeze guards as @BusHunter nicknamed them a few years ago when they first started appearing on CTA buses. That pretty much proved that CTA could have retired those old Novas ages ago when the first 225 newer model Novas were completely delivered. And CTA already divvied up artics differently when the shutdown of the city first started. This just builds on that. So whether it's the 6400s finally coming out of service or 100 artics sitting parked because of CTA bus operations bosses' goofy deployment decisions, the CTA had 100 more buses in its active fleet than it actually needed, and the pandemic impacts on service levels made that even more obvious. CTA found a way to use more buses out of its roughly 300 artics for now with the 6400s off the road. But service frequencies, passenger counts, and ridership patterns of individual routes show that under normal non-quarantine conditions CTA can get by well with just over 200 artics instead of just over 300. 

[andrethebusman]

15 hours ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Surprised the 146 isn’t included as well. Also surprised that the 54 warrants this level of service, but I’m never over west, so that’s probably why. Also surprised at the 71, they haven’t even been using artics recently. Those will probably be the ones normally used on the 26

All-day trains? RAD?

CTA calls what a bus does from pullout to pullin a "train". Can have multiple drivers during that time. RAD is "run as directed" - no schedule, operate on supervisor instructions. On 9 and 63 these are "second sections" closely following a regular run to spread the load.

[andrethebusman]

7 hours ago, BusHunter said:

Surprised to hear #22 is losing artics. That route has pretty good ridership. So hopefully they are  adding service or that route will be fubar. Once everything opens up they may have to modify this pick. #146 without artics will be a joke at normal service levels. 

With the street closures for the open streets, theres going to be a few problems. One of the biggest will be the Broadway closure between Belmont and diversey. I think that whole area around belmont and halsted will get heavily gridlocked. Belmont is backed up now west of broadway. The #36s will be late, the #77s will be a disaster and the #22s with no artics will be close behind. Anything that goes to belmont and halsted like the #156 will be affected too. The riders are smart up north I see them flocking to marine drive and downtown or along lincoln park they will ride the #22. But then again 26th street is going to be an interesting closure also. 

60 will have to detour via 31st. In retrospect, rather stupid idea.

[andrethebusman]

7 hours ago, BusHunter said:

Surprised to hear #22 is losing artics. That route has pretty good ridership. So hopefully they are  adding service or that route will be fubar. Once everything opens up they may have to modify this pick. #146 without artics will be a joke at normal service levels. 

With the street closures for the open streets, theres going to be a few problems. One of the biggest will be the Broadway closure between Belmont and diversey. I think that whole area around belmont and halsted will get heavily gridlocked. Belmont is backed up now west of broadway. The #36s will be late, the #77s will be a disaster and the #22s with no artics will be close behind. Anything that goes to belmont and halsted like the #156 will be affected too. The riders are smart up north I see them flocking to marine drive and downtown or along lincoln park they will ride the #22. But then again 26th street is going to be an interesting closure also. 

146 will be at "normal service levels" only midday. Rush is severely cut. LaSalle local about 10 min in rush, 135 about same. Anything going downtown cut in the rush.

[andrethebusman]

7 hours ago, Anthony Devera said:

I'm not sure why the 20, 53, and 54 are more of a priority for artics than the 22 and 146. But to be fair, it will take a while for ridership levels to return to the way they were before the pandemic, and it's possible that the 20, 53, and 54 didn't see as significant of a ridership drop during the lockdown, so they're more likely to be crowded once everything opens up again. Since there are about 100 surplus artics, does this mean all of them will be utilized now? I'm assuming not, considering artics are being taken off of the 22 and 146 (if I understand correctly).

What I think should happen is that the in-service artics remain on the routes they were on before, and the surplus artics are split somehow between Chicago (20, 53, 54, 66, 72, 74) and 77th (2, 3, 4, 79, 87). Or some of those artics could be put in service at NP (36, 155). Yes, I know dwell time was a problem before, but I feel like now there should be different priorities. I'm wondering how some transit systems (such as Seattle) are able to successfully run artics on local routes, but Chicago seems to have trouble with it, and if Chicago could somehow learn from those transit systems.

Cities that run artics on local routes have very slow schedules on those routes. Under current riding levels, dwell times lot less of an issue. If riding picks up (and there is a lot of reason to believe that will be a long time), artics will have to be redeployed again.

[orionbuslover]

15 minutes ago, jajuan said:

You're trying to make an apples and oranges argument here. The spare ratio among the 40 footers was no where near as high as with the artics. The overall number of 40 footers parked vs what was on the street as a percentage just was not anywhere as near as high as that for the artics. And now we're seeing that the extra artics that are now on the street instead of sitting parked in the garage has effectively sidelined what remained of the 6400 series Novas because those buses don't have the security shields, which really have literally become sneeze guards as @BusHunter nicknamed them a few years ago when they first started appearing on CTA buses. That pretty much proved that CTA could have retired those old Novas ages ago when the first 225 newer model Novas were completely delivered. And CTA already divvied up artics differently when the shutdown of the city first started. This just builds on that. So whether it's the 6400s finally coming out of service or 100 artics sitting parked because of CTA bus operations bosses' goofy deployment decisions, the CTA had 100 more buses in its active fleet than it actually needed, and the pandemic impacts on service levels made that even more obvious. CTA found a way to use more buses out of its roughly 300 artics for now with the 6400s off the road. But service frequencies, passenger counts, and ridership patterns of individual routes show that under normal non-quarantine conditions CTA can get by well with just over 200 artics instead of just over 300. 

Again my argument is that I'm not convinced CTA is convinced they have a surplus. If CTA thought they had an extra 100 artics, then why pull artics off their normal assignments to cover for new assignments? Wouldn't that make any surplus larger?

[andrethebusman]

3 minutes ago, orionbuslover said:

Again my argument is that I'm not convinced CTA is convinced they have a surplus. If CTA thought they had an extra 100 artics, then why pull artics off their normal assignments to cover for new assignments? Wouldn't that make any surplus larger?

What is happening is more that a lot of artics being used for rush hour express trippers are going into all-day service on local routes. More standard buses will now be used rush only.

[jajuan]

6 minutes ago, orionbuslover said:

Again my argument is that I'm not convinced CTA is convinced they have a surplus. If CTA thought they had an extra 100 artics, then why pull artics off their normal assignments to cover for new assignments? Wouldn't that make any surplus larger?

Okay you're not convinced. That's your own issue to work out on your own. That's not up for any of us to fix. But it does not change the fact that based on deployment patterns, CTA was holding on to 100 more buses than needed, be it old Novas that could have been retired without buying new buses to accomplish it or 100 artics that were repurposed after those Novas got sidelined.

[orionbuslover]

I wasn't looking for a doctor to fix anything. I'll go back to lurking now. Thanks.

[BusHunter]

I just dont get why they dont put a few artics here a few artics there and mix them with the 40 foot buses. There are alot of routes that could use artics, and not running them on 63rd is no excuse because you could put a few 77th operators there. The yard is 14 blocks away..alot of south side service is getting heavy ridership. I have seen this driving out there. Where are the #4 artics 63rd and cottage is busy. The #55 couldnt use artics?? If indeed they are sitting around that's a royal waste. Those buses are hybrids for the most part they are saving gas. Why run junky #6400s, that makes no sense only to parts dealers. Long ago they had a good plan with short buses but bought from the wrong company. Take a page from Pace they are running alot of divisions on 30 foot buses. Cta could be saving that money. The #48 doesnt need a 40 foot bus. The #43 or #31 dont. The #55A dont. The #68 or #88 doesnt. Spreading buses around the city and usng them according to ridership is smart. Well have to see what happens. 

 

[Anthony Devera]

9 hours ago, BusHunter said:

I just dont get why they dont put a few artics here a few artics there and mix them with the 40 foot buses. There are alot of routes that could use artics, and not running them on 63rd is no excuse because you could put a few 77th operators there. The yard is 14 blocks away..alot of south side service is getting heavy ridership. I have seen this driving out there. Where are the #4 artics 63rd and cottage is busy. The #55 couldnt use artics?? If indeed they are sitting around that's a royal waste. Those buses are hybrids for the most part they are saving gas. Why run junky #6400s, that makes no sense only to parts dealers. Long ago they had a good plan with short buses but bought from the wrong company. Take a page from Pace they are running alot of divisions on 30 foot buses. Cta could be saving that money. The #48 doesnt need a 40 foot bus. The #43 or #31 dont. The #55A dont. The #68 or #88 doesnt. Spreading buses around the city and usng them according to ridership is smart. Well have to see what happens. 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the management at Chicago and 77th decided to get rid of their artics because they were making routes much slower, and the remaining artic garages didn't really need more, so that's why we have the surplus. It would be best if Chicago and 77th would keep their artics; they both have routes that could really use them. And FG and 74th also have routes that could use them. If artics didn't work on the 66, how do they work on the 12? I left out the 79 because Chicago and Roosevelt are mostly 4-lane roads, while 79th is mostly a 2-lane road, and that might be a factor.

Instead of just normal 30' buses, I wonder if cutaway vans could be a solution for some routes. Those would be good for routes that run on narrow streets (96, 172), and they would be more fuel-efficient than a 30' bus.