Why not one system for chicago.

[TheTransitJock]

Philadelphia and Boston has one system running everything, the buses, subway, and Regional rail, why not Chicago do the same. That way cta won't have to fight with metra over the south chicago line and blue island line on the ME District. that way we won't have to pay seperate fares on when we want to ride pace, or have to ride pace, like the 353 riders that live on king dr. south of 95th. it's just a thought.

[Busjack]

Many of the rest of us have been advocating that for about the past two years. See, for instance, the discussion at this point about Pace.

If you want to know the reasons, they are historical (i.e. the CTA was here first) and political (the mayor of Chicago does not want to give up de facto control of the CTA, and suburbanites don't want the mayor's political appointees running their systems). That isn't necessarily confined to the current mayor.

When the RTA was formed in 1974, the CTA and the private carriers in the suburbs were still providing service, and the RTA didn't start assuming operations until the Rock Island and Milwaukee Road went bankrupt. Basically as a result of the RTA running out of money, resulting in the private entities stopping providing service, it was reorganized in 1983, bought out most of the private bus companies, and the 1983 Act organized Metra and Pace to operate the acquired properties.

However, a political compromise that might have worked in 1983 doesn't work now.

As far as 353, you don't have to pay a separate fare if you use a Chicago Card or the like. The separate fare issue arose when CTA quit issuing transfers and therefore accepting Pace ones. Similarly, a joint 7 day pass may be used, but not the CTA 7 day pass, because the CTA and RTA quit reimbursing Pace. However, again 353 is an anachronism, in that South Suburban Safeway Lines took over King Dr. when CSL or CMC didn't extend their lines that far or to Altgeld Gardens. CTA and Pace swapped ends of that route (34 now goes to Altgeld), but most of us have argued that short turns to 136th should be CTA's responsibility, as all residential areas served by that part of the line are in Chicago.

[artthouwill]

Philadelphia and Boston has one system running everything, the buses, subway, and Regional rail, why not Chicago do the same. That way cta won't have to fight with metra over the south chicago line and blue island line on the ME District. that way we won't have to pay seperate fares on when we want to ride pace, or have to ride pace, like the 353 riders that live on king dr. south of 95th. it's just a thought.

Definitely political. One of the reasons RTA was put in place was to have oversight of the CTA which SUBURBAN pols wanted to reign in allocations given to CTA and instead redirect monies to the suburbs. They also fear that a one system plan would put too much power in the city's (Daley's) hand, and we know Daley is not a fan of suburbia. This has even played out with the O'Hare expansion debacle. O'Hare is in city limits, but surrounded by suburbs. Daley wants expansion, the suburbs are opposed to it. The state of Illinois (under then Republican governor Edgar?) moves to create a regional state airport which would give it jurisdiction of Chicago airports, thus possibley railroading expansion. Da Mayor counters by forming an alliance with Gary Airport as a way to circumvent and prevent the state from getting control of the moneymaking airports.

[jajuan]

Yes political as stated by our fellow two members above. To add into that mix is the fact that some of that political friction is along party lines as hinted at in arthouwill's post above. Chicago Democrats vs. suburban Republicans (some of those on the local levels from those respective suburban city councils/town boards and the rest Republicans in the state legislature). That proposed airport authority was thought up when Republicans had control of the legislature, governor's mansion and every state constitutional office from 1994-1996 IIRC. Some circles viewed it as part of Republican punishment against areas in the state that voted Democrat (Chicago being Dem country) due to some reports in the Chicago SunTimes that the Republican majority had their Dem counterparts using broom closets and such for offices down in Springfield. Enough of the political history though. Basically until the political climate in northeast Illinois changes, this is the mess we all have to continue to deal with.

[Busjack]

Yes political as stated by our fellow two members above. To add into that mix is the fact that some of that political friction is along party lines as hinted at in arthouwill's post above. Chicago Democrats vs. suburban Republicans (some of those on the local levels from those respective suburban city councils/town boards and the rest Republicans in the state legislature). ...

I'm not arguing with the above, but it does seem like the balance of power in the legislature has shifted in that those wanting a state solution now have to rely on suburban politicians (up to now Julie Hamos (D), now Elaine Nekritz (D), and apparently still Sid Mathias (R*)) to get transit bills through the legislature. CTA at least had the threat over Hamos that it would cut service in Evanston (some speculated that that was a reason that the initial Doomsday plans were as they were), but that isn't available against Nekritz and Mathias.

People here talk about Hendon and the like, but I noted back in 2007 that most of the sponsors of the RTA Bill were from the suburbs, and I argue that the following provisions were inserted into the RTA Act as a result of suburban clout, and hence the CTA does not want to go back to the legislature soon:

• Suburban Community Mobility Fund--off the top
• $7.5 million for job access for residents of South Cook County--ditto
• BRT project on I-55 (sound familiar?)

On the other hand, things suggested by the Auditor General, such as service coordination, are prefaced with such clauses as "upon the affirmative vote of 9 of the then Directors of the Authority." When I talked to Julie Hamos about that section, I said that the "may" in that clause in the prior version of the bill should be "must," but I see that some politician subsequently got it watered down, to assure that it wouldn't be used. I wonder which ones did?

Hence, it is not just a (D) vs. (R_) question (most of northern Cook County was reapportioned to force out many of the Republican representatives), but a regional battle over clout. If the question is who doesn't have clout, it is probably (R-) from McHenry County, since McHenry never wanted anything to do with the RTA.

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*I see that the software wants to change the R symbol to ®.

[crosstowntravel]

I agree that it would be great if Chicago all had one system. I don't live in Chicago, but have taken the buses. You said that Philadelphia and Boston all have one system. I recently took the subway in Boston (orange line) from Boston North Station to Boston Back Bay to catch Amtrak heading towards Chicago. The Charlie card worked on the subways.

I would really appreciate ideas you could send re: public transit as I want to write about it and be an advocate of it. I live about a two hour drive east of Chicago, but use a lot of public transit systems all over the country as part of my job as a contract driver (getting back to northern IN). I've started to write for Examiner.com re: public transit. If any of you have ideas, please send them to me...OK. Thanks.

[New Flyer]

There will never be one system because of politics and bullshit

[Busjack]

What might be the better question is how the other systems (like those listed in this post) were able to get the whole metropolitan area to agree, since we know why this one didn't. Anyone have any information on that?

[KevinTTJ]

hey everyone this is the transit jock. My new profile is KevinTTJ, hence the (TTJ). I forgot my password and I can't remember my old email address,

so I started a new one.

I want to thank everyone for the comments on my last post.

I think cta Schould be one system, and to hell with the suburbs, and if they don't like they, we can cut suburban service, and they ain't gonna have shit!!!

[Busjack]

I think cta Schould be one system, and to hell with the suburbs, and if they don't like they, we can cut suburban service, and they ain't gonna have shit!!!

Despite your profanity, you have a deal if CTA quits collecting taxes in the suburbs (through the RTA and state), including those in Cook County. Then see where city service ends up.

Remember with the "No Wal-Mart" crowd pushing that business into Evergreen Park and Hammond, and lame duck Todd Stroger's sales tax still being in effect and pushing people on the border to do their business in Lake and DuPage Counties, Chicago isn't doing so well generating its own sales tax revenue. So, I think you should be more polite to those who actually pay the freight for the CTA.

[RailBus63]

The Boston area could have ended up with a Pace-style suburban bus authority (or two). The original Boston Elevated Railway system that was taken over by the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) in 1947 encompassed the city of Boston and 13 surrounding cities and towns. Most bus service in the area outside of the MTA system was provided by the large Eastern Mass. Street Railway system (all bus after 1948) and the smaller Middlesex & Boston Street Railways system (also all bus). The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) was created in 1964 with a greatly enlarged service area covering 78 cities and towns (including much, but not all, of the EMSR and M&B systems). The MBTA began subsidizing the suburban bus systems and the commuter rail system but also announced a program of rapid transit extensions that would severely hurt the most profitable routes of the private companies. The Red Line extension to Quincy would kill the EMSR’s busy Quincy-Fields Corner route and the bus company sued. The MBTA eventually agreed to purchase the EMSR in 1968 and took over the M&B in 1972.

A few years later, with most of the bus companies outside of the MBTA area in financial trouble, the state legislature passed a law allowing the creation of regional transit authorities. Had the Eastern Mass./ and the M&B hung on a few years longer, it’s possible that we could have seen RTA’s on the South Shore and North Shore instead of the MBTA.

[Busjack]

What you describe in Massachusetts is similar to how the CTA took over the Chicago Motor Coach, by running on the same streets. However, that was all in the city.

What may be distinguishable is while the CTA had and still has the legal authority to take over anything in Cook County outside the panhandle townships (in short, anything east of 12000W) and probably anything that connected with that territory, Krambles's book says that while early boards studied it, the conditions on the bonds CTA issued when it first acquired CSL and CRT precluded doing that as a practical matter. He talks about studying taking over West Towns and other companies (essentially now Pace West), but says that the companies in that area were already too broke. Similarly, Krambles and chicago-l.org* document various studies by the CTA to reinstate service on the Chicago, North Shore & Milwaukee, and the Chicago, Aurora and Elgin, but they fell apart because they were not financially feasible. Basically, except for Evanston calling in CTA when the Evanston Bus Company went out of business, the basic assumption after 1974 was that it was the RTA's job to stabilize the suburban systems, until the RTA fell apart in the early 1980s and had to be reconstituted into what became the current mess.

The only thing I found really analogous to the Chicago situation is Detroit, but, beyond the obvious political similarities, the City of Detroit had taken over the streetcar system in the 1920s. However, others have pointed out situations where suburban municipalities have acted "only slightly coordinated" with the regional one, such as Virginia municipalities providing local bus service in WMATA territory.

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*Very off the point, but I saw Graham Garfield in a PSA on Channel 20 about what to do during the service cuts.

[jajuan]

Despite your profanity, you have a deal if CTA quits collecting taxes in the suburbs (through the RTA and state), including those in Cook County. Then see where city service ends up.

Remember with the "No Wal-Mart" crowd pushing that business into Evergreen Park and Hammond, and lame duck Todd Stroger's sales tax still being in effect and pushing people on the border to do their business in Lake and DuPage Counties, Chicago isn't doing so well generating its own sales tax revenue. So, I think you should be more polite to those who actually pay the freight for the CTA.

I wouldn't go so far as to say the suburbs are paying the freight but they are helping out which I would say is equitable since suburbanites do use CTA service just as some of us in Chicago use Pace and Metra.

[Busjack]

I wouldn't go so far as to say the suburbs are paying the freight but they are helping out which I would say is equitable since suburbanites do use CTA service just as some of us in Chicago use Pace and Metra.

I might have gone a bit overboard in response to Mr. Banned, but there is an underlying point I last made elsewhere, as my Wal-Mart statement typifies.

Basically, when you look at the formula (RTA Act 4.03.3) the setasides get taken off the top (and I commented that the suburbs benefit from two of them), then, out of the "old money," RTA gets its discretionary 15% regionwide, most of which goes to the CTA, then of the "old money" (the ghost of the old funding formula survives, as typified by references to 80% of 85%; the 80% being 1 point of the 1.25 points now assessed by the RTA in Cook County), CTA gets 100% of the sales tax collected in the city and 30% in Cook County outside of Chicago. The "new money" (the 1/4% added in 2008) is "allocated 48% to the Chicago Transit Authority, 39% to the Commuter Rail Board and 13% to the Suburban Bus Board." The collar counties themselves get the additional .25% from when their taxes went from .25% to .75%.

The legislation also authorized the Chicago City Council to impose the Real Estate Transfer Tax for the benefit of the CTA, to pay the pension bonds, but we know that the real estate market is currently in the toilet.

Hence, while the CTA is getting virtually everything generated in the city--except the off the tops and the 52% of the new .25%--it is also getting the 15% discretionary off the top and the 48% of the last .25% from the rest of the region.

One can debate whether that is fair or not, depending on how much service is provided by the CTA to suburbanites, and the Auditor General's finding about 3 years ago that the collar counties were undersupporting Metra.

Also, since this is sales tax, it depends on where you shop, not where you live. That is where my Wal-Mart comment came in. If city people are supporting suburban business because certain aldermen want to keep sales tax generators out, that cuts the CTA's take. Similarly, if people in the border areas shop in adjoining counties, because of the Stroger tax increases on top of already high sales taxes in Cook County, that really cuts the CTA's take, except that it still gets the 15% of the first .25% and the 43% of the second .25%.

At first I was somewhat incensed by Jesse Jackson Jr.'s comment that the inner city is subsidizing Metra, when the opposite seems true, since neither Metra nor Pace get any of the old money generated in the city. However, he may be right if the city so discourages sales tax generators that they are shopping outside the city.

One can also rest assured that if someone did what Mr. Banned suggested, any support for transit taxes in the suburbs would evaporate. McHenry County was never too fond of the RTA, even though their riders probably underpay for Metra. However, they certainly don't need, and certainly are not getting, much of any bus service. DuPage is certainly getting its .25%, but there are the frequent public hearings resulting in Pace saying that if it doesn't pony up its contribution, routes such as 714 will be cut.

You also know that my view is colored by Frank Kruesi's and Carole Brown's position in 2005 that city taxes should not go up, and there shouldn't be a differential between the city and suburbs, even though there is a differential in service. However, the legislature, in passing this 2008 funding formula, put a fork into that theory. I think that is a reason why Daley doesn't want to go back there, although he seems to be the only politician to realize that the taxpayers are tapped out.

[Busjack]

This seems like the best place to resurrect this.

I saw on the homepage a link to 10 Radical Ideas For Chicago, Cook County - Southwest News-Herald.

Wondering about the CTA connection, it says:

2. Consolidate the various transportation agencies and service in Chicago and the suburbs into one system. Expand existing CTA services beyond Chicago's borders to the suburbs in the six county region, merging it with PACE. Place the entire system under the control of one new board consisting of board members selected from the region's most successful mid-sized businesses.

Now, I wouldn't have phrased it in this manner, but if Cicero spokesperson Ray Hannina can figure that out, why can't the politicos who run this state? The answer is political vested interests, including in graft.

Of course, one of the problems is that the original MTA Act, which is the basis of the CTA, said that the board members shall be "persons of recognized business ability" but has been consistently ignored, especially recently.

BTW, he is completely loco in suggesting a County Board with 250 aldermen and 100 senators, even if consolidation of municipal units might make sense.

[Guest]

It would be nice for one unified transit system for Chicago and the six county region. Id like picturing a unified system in Chicago with transit systems of NW Indiana such as Gary, Hammond, Champaign/Urbana and to the NW such as Rockford Mass Transit linking with the current the Metra commuter rail. It would nice!!! :)

[Busjack]

It would be nice for one unified transit system for Chicago and the six county region. Id like picturing a unified system in Chicago with transit systems of NW Indiana such as Gary, Hammond, Champaign/Urbana and to the NW such as Rockford Mass Transit linking with the current the Metra commuter rail. It would nice!!!

There are some agreements between NICTD and Metra (apparently making Hegewisch a Metra station) and apparently some sort of interchange agreement at Hammond with Pace.

Champaign or Rockford would have to take a massive extension of commuter rail. The latter has been discussed, but I doubt that any way has been found to fund it, or incorporate counties outside of the RTA into some system.

Of course, if you are talking about unifying operations, NW Indiana seems to continue being completely fouled up with regard to even integration GPTC into a regional system, and figuring out some regional, permanent tax support.

[Guest]

There are some agreements between NICTD and Metra (apparently making Hegewisch a Metra station) and apparently some sort of interchange agreement at Hammond with Pace.

Champaign or Rockford would have to take a massive extension of commuter rail. The latter has been discussed, but I doubt that any way has been found to fund it, or incorporate counties outside of the RTA into some system.

Of course, if you are talking about unifying operations, NW Indiana seems to continue being completely fouled up with regard to even integration GPTC into a regional system, and figuring out some regional, permanent tax support.

I think we all believe this would be a welcome to the Chicago region, if only all the legalities could be worked out. Rockford is of course within reach. The city of Rockford has expressed much interest in the expansion of Metra service to that area as well as bringing much need revenue and jobs to that region. Champ/Urbana would be excellent for Univ. of Ill. students and staff. The Gary/Hammond area desperately needs the money and the jobs.

[Busjack]

The Gary/Hammond area desperately needs the money and the jobs.

The transit agencies need the money, but Illinois is certainly not going to be bailing them out.

As far as the area needing jobs, that's relative in that industry is still there, while (except for the Ford plant) it isn't on the south side. (Compare the steel mills with the empty South Works land and other areas in South Chicago.) NICTD did note a couple of years ago that its ridership was down because there weren't the jobs in Chicago

Apparently River Oaks needs the business coming from Hammond via Route 364, as that seems to be the only reason to make that trip.