More Bus Moves

[BusHunter]

Riders waiting at Six corners (Irving Pk/Cicero EB) have only 4 more minutes to wait to catch the #63 to Stony Island according to this sign.

[jajuan]

Riders waiting at Six corners (Irving Pk/Cicero EB) have only 4 more minutes to wait to catch the #63 to Stony Island according to this sign.

63 at six corners.png

Wow talk about your mix ups.

[pudgym29]

Oh wow. I have a photo of that as well. I wonder which Bus Stop on 63rd St. is getting route #54A & #80 arrival data?

[Tmc cta 4550]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3-RFeSe5jw

when was this on the blue line

[busfan2847]

Oh wow. I have a photo of that as well. I wonder which Bus Stop on 63rd St. is getting route #54A & #80 arrival data?

On Sunday around 12 noon the stop on Dearborn at Monroe was showing times for State St routes and not the 22, 36.

[BusHunter]

Oh wow. I have a photo of that as well. I wonder which Bus Stop on 63rd St. is getting route #54A & #80 arrival data?

That's still like that? My picture is about 10 days old.

[YoungBusLover]

I saw one of the most weirdest things today. I never seen a nova running on the 28 ever,but it had to be a fill in from 77th.

[Mr.cta85]

I saw one of the most weirdest things today. I never seen a nova running on the 28 ever,but it had to be a fill in from 77th.

Yeah it probably was a loaner from 77th, but about a week ago I saw nova bus 6502 on the 15 so maybe 103rd garage getting a few Novas considering the new pick starts on the 20th. As a 103rd Operator I personally hope we get a few cause I would love to drive one lol. That's the only bus I haven't drove in the current fleet of buses.

[Bus fanatic30]

How do u guys know which bus goes where? Is there a wed site.am new to this and am really interested in this and all topics about cta

[jajuan]

How do u guys know which bus goes where? Is there a wed site.am new to this and am really interested in this and all topics about cta

Well one way is looking at the garage code shown as part of a bus's run number and on the garage sticker applied on each bus's front windshield. Those codes are given in the garage section of this forum. Each garage's assigned bus routes along with the relevant run number blocks for those routes are also given in the garage section.

[Bus fanatic30]

Thanks that helps a lot for now on I will be paying attention

[Busjack]

Well one way is looking at the garage code shown as part of a bus's run number and on the garage sticker applied on each bus's front windshield. Those codes are given in the garage section of this forum. Each garage's assigned bus routes along with the relevant run number blocks for those routes are also given in the garage section.

It is a lot easier than it was before 1973, when the only way was "why does this part of town only have 5700s and 8800s east and west and 8200s and 3200s north and south?" "Why does this 8200 only have 'East Terminal' on its sign?" Also, basically the only way you could find out where a garage was was to call the number on the advertising card that said "buy tokens at your nearest CTA facility."

Some people here can still identify assignments by fleet number, but they sure are not as consecutive as they once were.

The garage sticker is usually the clue, because it usually takes a couple of days to scrape them off.

The other clue, as jajuan indicated, is that Novas and artics are only assigned to certain garages. For instance, 152 Addison has artics, but while it is a Forest Glen garage route, Forest Glen doesn't have any, so those come from North Park. Apparently the same for 66 Chicago (Chicago/Kedzie).

[jajuan]

It is a lot easier than it was before 1973, when the only way was "why does this part of town only have 5700s and 8800s east and west and 8200s and 3200s north and south?" "Why does this 8200 only have 'East Terminal' on its sign?" Also, basically the only way you could find out where a garage was was to call the number on the advertising card that said "buy tokens at your nearest CTA facility."

Some people here can still identify assignments by fleet number, but they sure are not as consecutive as they once were.

The garage sticker is usually the clue, because it usually takes a couple of days to scrape them off.

The other clue, as jajuan indicated, is that Novas and artics are only assigned to certain garages. For instance, 152 Addison has artics, but while it is a Forest Glen garage route, Forest Glen doesn't have any, so those come from North Park. Apparently the same for 66 Chicago (Chicago/Kedzie).

I'm just old enough to remember buses with signs that said East Terminal, North Terminal, etc. when I was a kid. It wasn't until I was older that I made the connection that those buses were borrowed from other garages or recently reassigned but not equipped with the new garage's roll sign bands. One thing I do remember is having a bus pull up downtown with one of those signs and folks being puzzled at which route it was serving since of course most downtown stops are served by several different bus routes.

[MTRSP1900-CTA3200]

On my commute home today the first Green Line train to Harlem I was on got tripped just west of Tower 18 at a red signal. Operator got out and fixed it up and we were on our way in about 5 minutes. Next at Cicero, our operator announces that the train will go express to Oak Park, and I get off to get the next train to Ridgeland. On the next train, we approach Central and the train goes into full braking and stops about 1/4th down the platform, with the operator's foot on the horn pedal the entire time. The operator sticks his head out the window and talks to some people before pulling to the stop marker like normal. Interesting set of rides.

[Busjack]

I'm just old enough to remember buses with signs that said East Terminal, North Terminal, etc. when I was a kid. It wasn't until I was older that I made the connection that those buses were borrowed from other garages or recently reassigned but not equipped with the new garage's roll sign bands. One thing I do remember is having a bus pull up downtown with one of those signs and folks being puzzled at which route it was serving since of course most downtown stops are served by several different bus routes.

The first time I noticed this was when there was a dead route 55 bus, and a supervisor pulled up a bus with an "East Terminal" sign on it, and said it was a 77th bus. My first reaction was "there isn't a bus on 77th St.," until I realized that he meant something different.

[artthouwill]

The first time I noticed this was when there was a dead route 55 bus, and a supervisor pulled up a bus with an "East Terminal" sign on it, and said it was a 77th bus. My first reaction was "there isn't a bus on 77th St.," until I realized that he meant something different.

That's funny, considering most of my childhood, it was 77th that was running other garage based buses on its routes, primarily 79th St. I guess this was due to the Main Shop being located there.

[Busjack]

That's funny, considering most of my childhood, it was 77th that was running other garage based buses on its routes, primarily 79th St. I guess this was due to the Main Shop being located there.

What I mentioned was a one time occurrence. As I noted, what was running E-W between 55 and 75 was mostly older, compared to what was running on 4 and 28. Also, it didn't get any of the pine and lime buses until late 1973.

[trainman8119]

I've been seeing a few 1270 series buses that were at Forest Glen showing up on 103rd routes the past few days. Is the Glen giving them up for good, are they loaners and if they are moved, what is FG getting in its place ??? Just curious

[BusHunter]

Those #1270's have been at 103rd since the ryan shutdown. #1269-65 also went to NP. FG recently received #1080's and 90's to compensate. I've been told half the FG Optimas are not even going out on a daily basis. They need repairs. I guess those buses really are junk.

[jajuan]

The first time I noticed this was when there was a dead route 55 bus, and a supervisor pulled up a bus with an "East Terminal" sign on it, and said it was a 77th bus. My first reaction was "there isn't a bus on 77th St.," until I realized that he meant something different.

I noticed that they kind of fell into disuse during the 1990s as the fishbowls got knocked out by TMCs, Flxible 5300 and 6000 series, and the NF 5800s which of course had electronic destination signs as did the Americanas CTA's final 1980s model purchased. They came back into some limited use in 2000 and 2001 with the D901s getting swapped around like crazy between Kedzie, Archer, 77th and Forest Glen before final retirement in 2002 as the Novas came in to facilitate retirement of more nonaccessible buses (mainly through accessible bus models already here being swapped around among garages that wouldn't get Novas).

[artthouwill]

What I mentioned was a one time occurrence. As I noted, what was running E-W between 55 and 75 was mostly older, compared to what was running on 4 and 28. Also, it didn't get any of th

e pine and lime buses until late 1973.

You're exactly right. I certainly remember those days.

[jajuan]

No Sign of HoDar, but when is the 1st train to 95th & the last train to Ashland/63rd & The opening ceremony of the Red Line South??

On the bus side of things, the question is also whether or not a significant number of the Novas will see retirement since the 100 extra artics do have to go somewhere, a really relevant point Busjack made in response to a post I made to a different question and it seems appropriate to pose under this thread. Not only do those 100 artics have to be placed somewhere but bus service is set to go back to pre-shutdown levels, levels that don't require 100 extra buses regardless of model. It's already been kind of implied that the current Novas would be partially retired by the 4300s after the Dan Ryan rail service reopens, with the next series of Novas to retire the rest by virtue of CTA announcing award of the 40-foot portion of the recent bid request going to Nova for a minimum 350 40-foot buses but months later still not yet announcing who they'll go into contract with for the artics in that bid request. So basically one way or the other we'll see how fast up to 100 of the 6400 series Novas get knocked off CTA's bus roster once October 20th gets here.

[BusHunter]

I already haven't seen a few Novas from 77th in a while. Alot of them are low #6400's. Some of them are #6401-04, #6407 which I haven't seen lately.

Anyone think CTA is not only going to lose buses, but lose railcars? The Dan ryan is now going to be 3 times faster. That could translate to about 1/6 of the Red line fleet not being needed or around 50 cars. That may just fall in line with the awarding of 70 #2400 cars for scrap Busjack was referring to before. That contract was awarded but i have yet to see more than about 20 cars go to the long term hold list. This may be when that changes. The recent addition of #2400's on the Orange line leads me to suspect some #2400 cars might be leaving there soon as well.

[jajuan]

Well the advanced Red Line schedule shows weekday intervals still being as low as three minutes and no evidence of any short turning at Roosevelt that some had speculated so it doesn't really look like they're reducing Red Line car counts by all that much. But with bus service levels dropping back down and bringing things back to the topic of what happens as far as buses go, it's seeming pretty definite they shouldn't need up to 100 extra buses on the roster when the Dan Ryan service resumes.

[KedziePink]

I'm wondering, since when did Yellow Line trains have automated announcements for stops other than Howard? I was on a 5000-series train to Skokie on Saturday, and was surprised to hear Mr. CTA say, "Welcome aboard Yellow Line run 594. Oakton-Skokie is next." I was on the Yellow Line northbound back in July, and I only heard a manual announcement. It's interesting how there seems to be a longer pause between Oakton and Skokie in the announcement, when compared with announcements for other stations with hyphenated names.