CTA Service Adjustments

[renardo870]

The 1st EB 35th street bus leaving 24th had a driver who had her map in hand while navigating the route. She did fine.

I had just missed a Forest Pk train at Jackson. There was an immediate follower, but it was only going to UIC. The frequency of trains seemed to be high for a Sunday, but that was between UIC and O'Hare.

On Saturday From O'Hare to UIC is 5-6 mins and From O'Hare to Forest Park is 10-12 mins from 7:30am to 8:30p and from 8:30p to 11:01p is 7.5 between O'Hare and UIC and every 15 to Forest Park. Reverse trips are 5-8 from UIC to O'Hare and every 10-15 from Forest Park from 830am to 11:45p

Sunday is every is every 6-8 Between O'Hare and UIC and every 12-15 minutes to Forest Park from 9a-6pm reverse trips are the same 10am - 640pm...Probably a lot of 4 car operations.

[Sam92]

Noticing a change in run numbers as well. The N5 bus that normally had run number 1257 now is run 1502. And the N9 run number that's usually 6398 is now 6098

[renardo870]

Noticing a change in run numbers as well. The N5 bus that normally had run number 1257 now is run 1502. And the N9 run number that's usually 6398 is now 6098

Yes, I saw #12 as K211 and K217. Old runs were K601's #18 K167 K168 Formally K561's. I saw #94 as 6916. I guess its a big shift in run numbers.

[ChicagoNova]

Whoever mentioned about routes 97 and 201 being taken care of solely by North Park and 205 & 206 solely by Forest Glen is right.

[Busjack]

Whoever mentioned about routes 97 and 201 being taken care of solely by North Park and 205 & 206 solely by Forest Glen is right.

Definitely to the extent that 205 is being run with 500s.

[Sam92]

Haven't seen a consistent run number on the 95E yet. Seen 1502, 1082 and 1902 instead of the usual 1200-1299. Seems like even MORE interlining maybe going on at the Dan Ryan. 1082 were run numbers for Rt. 111 and 1900 were run numbers for routes 103, 106 and 100

[jajuan]

Noticing a change in run numbers as well. The N5 bus that normally had run number 1257 now is run 1502. And the N9 run number that's usually 6398 is now 6098

Yes as mentioned the 12 went back to its old K200s that it had before the now dead 127 was assigned to Kedzie. I saw 74th runs of the 49 last night using 6450s instead of the prior 6650s and NP had 49B in the P800s now after being in the P400s previously.

And CTA hasn't removed those bus stop signs on Wilson for the 145 and previous incarnation of the 148. So when I passed Wilson on the 22 Clark this morning, I saw a gentleman who was waiting at the old southbound stop for those routes looking pretty exasperated that there was no bus coming because he didn't take notice of the two notices informing passengers that express service is eliminated from Wilson with the elimination of the 145 and rerouting of 148 onto Marine Drive to and from Foster.

[sw4400]

Well Sunday business definately felt different than normal yesterday with the elimination of the #11 Lincoln bus between Fullerton and Western. The beginning of a big drop most likely. But it seems like there might yet be a glimmer of hope....

Alderman Pawar and dozens of others took their fight to save the No. 11 to the CTA last week. Pawar says he was told by five of the seven board members they were willing to reconsider their decision to eliminate part of the route, but Sunday the bus between Western and Fullerton was history.

This was from the ABC 7 Story here about the service cuts taking effect.

Now suddenly 5 of the 7 board members are thinking "Well gee, maybe I should've left this route as it was." Feeling a bit of pinch on their job security, perhaps? If they weren't I'm sure they would've told Ald. Pawar "I'm sorry, but we voted to eliminate that portion of the route and will not change our vote."

[jajuan]

Well Sunday business definately felt different than normal yesterday with the elimination of the #11 Lincoln bus between Fullerton and Western. The beginning of a big drop most likely. But it seems like there might yet be a glimmer of hope....

Alderman Pawar and dozens of others took their fight to save the No. 11 to the CTA last week. Pawar says he was told by five of the seven board members they were willing to reconsider their decision to eliminate part of the route, but Sunday the bus between Western and Fullerton was history.

This was from the ABC 7 Story here about the service cuts taking effect.

Now suddenly 5 of the 7 board members are thinking "Well gee, maybe I should've left this route as it was." Feeling a bit of pinch on their job security, perhaps? If they weren't I'm sure they would've told Ald. Pawar "I'm sorry, but we voted to eliminate that portion of the route and will not change our vote."

So far all these folks have shown is their rank incompetence in that they are saying that they feel squeamish now about eliminating the middle part of the route with a few saying they were iffy about it all along, yet they went ahead and voted it through anyway. That at least says to me they rubber stamped this plan without really going through all the details.

[Busjack]

Now suddenly 5 of the 7 board members are thinking "Well gee, maybe I should've left this route as it was." Feeling a bit of pinch on their job security, perhaps? If they weren't I'm sure they would've told Ald. Pawar "I'm sorry, but we voted to eliminate that portion of the route and will not change our vote."

The only thing that would affect their job security is if Quinn or Emanuel told their appointees to get off the board.

As jajuan says, all they did was show their rank incompetence. Let's see if a repeal measure comes up for Wednesday's meeting. I'm still betting no. It isn't on the agenda (Word doc), although contracts with Wrigley and UPS are.

The board members are politicians enough not to pull an Urlacher and say that the public and media don't know anything.

[jajuan]

Remember these are the same people who according to the SunTimes were open to having an emergency meeting but reportedly said they didn't know the procedure for doing so.

[sw4400]

The only thing that would affect their job security is if Quinn or Emanuel told them to get off the board.

As jajuan says, all they did was show their rank incompetence. Let's see if a repeal measure comes up for Wednesday's meeting. I'm still betting no. It isn't on the agenda (Word doc), although contracts with Wrigley and UPS are.

The board members are politicians enough not to pull an Urlacher and say that the public and media don't know anything.

Well I hope a repeal does occur. They're getting all these new buses over the next few years, hiring all these new drivers for the Red Line Dan Ryan rehab. Why not after this project keep these operators on and start using them on the overcrowded routes to ease congestion? We should by that time have the mixed 100 artics and might even be starting to get that mixed order of 40' and 60' buses.

Why would the CTA outsource to a group at NUTC(Northwestern University Transportation Center) to determine what to keep, eliminate and scale back? Why not just have the chicagobus.org panel determine what buses to get in future orders since you're outsourcing for opinions? And I could determine the color scheme for said buses even though I'm color-blind and my choices would probably be an eye-sore to the public.

[jajuan]

Well I hope a repeal does occur. They're getting all these new buses over the next few years, hiring all these new drivers for the Red Line Dan Ryan rehab. Why not after this project keep these operators on and start using them on the overcrowded routes to ease congestion? We should by that time have the mixed 100 artics and might even be starting to get that mixed order of 40' and 60' buses.

Why would the CTA outsource to a group at NUTC(Northwestern University Transportation Center) to determine what to keep, eliminate and scale back? Why not just have the chicagobus.org panel determine what buses to get in future orders since you're outsourcing for opinions? And I could determine the color scheme for said buses even though I'm color-blind and my choices would probably be an eye-sore to the public.

The irony of them listening to the Northwestern group is that the service in Evanston got a cut also. I'm wondering if the poor guy that I mentioned I noticed from the Clark bus waiting for a 145/148 because CTA didn't remove the darn bus stops west of Clark ever got told that express bus service on Wilson no longer exists as of yesterday and today depending on whether he wanted 145 or 148.

[Busjack]

Why would the CTA outsource to a group at NUTC(Northwestern University Transportation Center) to determine what to keep, eliminate and scale back?

To give them cover. Like I mentioned, it was necessary (to CTA) to have such terms in the presentation as available service on cross streets.

As for your other suggestion, I've noted numerous instances above in this thread where certain members didn't show planning skills.

As one can frequently note, my issue is more with the public be damned attitude of the incompetent autocrats on the CTA Board, who even left it to Pace to describe what the alternative service was (including changes to 63W not in the presentation).

[jajuan]

To give them cover. Like I mentioned, it was necessary (to CTA) to have such terms in the presentation as available service on cross streets.

As for your other suggestion, I've noted numerous instances above in this thread where certain members didn't show planning skills.

As one can frequently note, my issue is more with the public be damned attitude of the incompetent autocrats on the CTA Board, who even left it to Pace to describe what the alternative service was (including changes to 63W not in the presentation).

Not just the public be damned attitude of the Board but also from Claypool in that he keeps giving that same tired response that the Brown Line is an adequate enough alternative for the cut portion of the 11 with no explanation of how the seniors that sw spoke of are supposed to navigate the 4 to 6 blocks to a Brown Line station when that question is posed to him, not to mention how the three daily trips added to the Brown Line is supposedly enough when a rough estimate based on the goal of 75 passengers max per car says ten trains using the eight-car consists would be needed to hold the 11's pre-Dec 16th ridership numbers or how the Brown Line is supposed to be a good alternative with less southbound trips into downtown. And that's not even counting that the 11 previously directly paralleled the Brown Line SOUTH of the Fullerton stop, not Western to Fullerton which is the portion they cut out.

[renardo870]

Not just the public be damned attitude of the Board but also from Claypool in that he keeps giving that same tired response that the Brown Line is an adequate enough alternative for the cut portion of the 11 with no explanation of how the seniors that sw spoke of are supposed to navigate the 4 to 6 blocks to a Brown Line station when that question is posed to him, not to mention how the three daily trips added to the Brown Line is supposedly enough when a rough estimate based on the goal of 75 passengers max per car says ten trains using the eight-car consists would be needed to hold the 11's pre-Dec 16th ridership numbers or how the Brown Line is supposed to be a good alternative with less southbound trips into downtown. And that's not even counting that the 11 previously directly paralleled the Brown Line SOUTH of the Fullerton stop, not Western to Fullerton which is the portion they cut out.

So how will the CTA save face regarding the Lincoln route? Restore the old Lincoln at least to North/Clark daily, since the 37 Sedgwick is up and running and then combine then on the next pick? Look like a case of left foot in mouth and right foot in the backside..really difficult to walk.

[jajuan]

So how will the CTA save face regarding the Lincoln route? Restore the old Lincoln at least to North/Clark daily, since the 37 Sedgwick is up and running and then combine then on the next pick? Look like a case of left foot in mouth and right foot in the backside..really difficult to walk.

Don't hold your breath on it.

[Busjack]

So how will the CTA save face regarding the Lincoln route? Restore the old Lincoln at least to North/Clark daily, since the 37 Sedgwick is up and running and then combine then on the next pick? Look like a case of left foot in mouth and right foot in the backside..really difficult to walk.

Aside from jajuan's comment, I'm sure that it the board were serious about this (and you can tell that I don't think so), they would have to direct staff to come up with a service plan, and then I suppose staff would have to say whether it would be feasible to go to before or after they connected Lincoln with Sedgwick. Then staff would hem and haw for a couple of months, and probably say that it was impossible.

[renardo870]

Aside from jajuan's comment, I'm sure that if the board were serious about this (and you can tell that I don't think so), they would have to direct staff to come up with a service plan, and then I suppose staff would have to say whether it would be feasible to go to before or after they connected Lincoln with Sedgwick. Then staff would hem and haw for a couple of months, and probably say that it was impossible.

Just picture a bunch of elderly people falling out on Lincoln where the bus used to stop or a bunch of irate riders hijacking a bus from Western demanding to drive south...funny but u get the idea!!!

Oh yeah, they are going to save $16 million from this de-crowding plan but has to spend $5.7 million to fix the Brown Line platforms that they didn't treat with protective weather coating, that CTA wants the Lincoln riders to ride. Not good math.

[Busjack]

Just picture a bunch of elderly people falling out on Lincoln whenre the bus used to stop or a bunch of ireate riders hijacking a bus from Western demanding to drive south...funny but u get the idea!!!

In the latter case, you would get a whole lot of cops out, and people spending the night in the police lockup, probably in the 19th Police District or Area 3. I don't know if the people are into civil disobedience.

[See Tea Eh]

Oh yeah, they are going to save $16 million from this de-crowding plan but has to spend $5.7 million to fix the Brown Line platforms that they didn't treat with protective weather coating, that CTA wants the Lincoln riders to ride. Not good math.

One is not related to the other. The Brown Line platform issue would have to be addressed regardless of whether or not they made any service changes this week.

[See Tea Eh]

how the three daily trips added to the Brown Line is supposedly enough when a rough estimate based on the goal of 75 passengers max per car says ten trains using the eight-car consists would be needed to hold the 11's pre-Dec 16th ridership numbers

Does that include the entire daily ridership (meaning, all day long, including when the Brown Line is not at capacity) for the entire route (including the segments that retain bus service)?

If so, then, if the passengers on the eliminated segment of the route do decide to take the Brown Line, how much capacity would be needed on the Brown Line?

The other issue with using "total ridership" is that it doesn't reflect peak loadings and on/offs. Two buses can serve 50 passengers, while one never gets above (for example) 15 passengers at any given time, and the other might have 45 passengers on board at once.

The 11 ran a 40-foot bus every 10-12 minutes (maybe less often than that? I can't remember) during rush hour. While it has been a couple years since I rode the 11 during rush hour, I don't recall seeing standees on the Lincoln segment when I did ride it. So, if we assume 40 passengers per bus (to make the math simple; 39 seat bus and we'll be generous and assume every seat is filled, plus one), at a 10-minute headway (again, I think the headway was a bit wider than that; certainly so during off-peak); you're talking 240 passengers per hour.

Spread across an eight-car train, at 10 trains per hour (peak headways are actually tighter than that on Brown; but again, this keeps the math simple), at most, you'd have an average of three extra Brown Line passengers per car assuming every displaced 11 rider switched to the Brown Line. Definitely a far cry from needing to add ten eight-car trains to cover for the change in the 11.

[BusHunter]

The biggest joke of all is according to the Redeye on Friday, the brown line is not going to receive any additional trains in the evening rush. So much for their decrowding and the #11 debacle. Only major pieces of lines will see extra trains like Rosemont/blue to UIC-halsted/blue. Riders on ends of routes are out. I haven't yet seen if this is reflected in the bus routes, but in speaking with other operators it sounds like that may be the case on certain routes. If so we may see bigger crowds on ends of routes.

[See Tea Eh]

With a few exceptions, ends of routes tend to have fairly low ridership anyway (exceptions being where the ends are major destinations; such as rail stations). Otherwise, it would make sense to have service targeted to where the bulk of the ridership is, no?

For example, I frequently take the Blue Line from Grand to Irving Park in the evening (around 6:30 pm). When the train pulls into Grand, you can barely squeeze onto the train. By the time we leave Logan Square, you get your choice of seats. If (and this isn't actually happening, not the least of which is because there is no good pocket track/turn facility) CTA added extra service to Logan Square, and as a result stretched out the headway north of there slightly, that would be justified based on the ridership. Folks beyond that point would still have plenty of room, but the service was added where the crowds were worst.

Same goes with the bus routes with short turns. The 146 has a lot of short turns now (both north and south end). During the morning rush, very few people are going to the Museum Campus, so why send buses all the way out there? If most of your riders are off by Harrison, then that's a good place to turn the bus around and send it back. There's more than enough space on the buses that do go to the museums to handle the riders that want to go down there.

[BusHunter]

I notice they were doing this on a few summer picks only with the buses like they were compensating on having extra buses for the Lincoln Pk/near north side beaches and other summer getaways. It's like robbing Peter to pay Paul. How do they justify doing that to the Brown line when the whole purpose of canning the #11 is to put extra riders on that service. In a way you are right in saying places like Congress blue line doesn't need more trains, it's under 8 riders per car now in the rush, but then again you are asking O'hare riders to pay more and be nixed from the extra service. So i guess it's a matter of who your asking. (if there service is better or not)