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#4000 - #4207 New Flyer Artic in service dates (street), lifetime assignments, factory dates


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  • 10 years later...
11 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

I'm not sure if it was cost saving measure done by CTA or New Flyer themselves but the #4000 and #4300s artics may have a similar Carbon Steel frame which is possibly another factor to add in as to why so many are sidelined as well. 

While I said it was a Seattle spec., you're correct that Huberman similarly cheapened the 4000s. A review of my search for "carbon steel" also turned up this Press Release (which also had the 3 for  4 lie):

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The bus has a smaller engine than traditional articulated buses. It uses the same low-emission engine that is used in CTA’s newest 40-foot buses. The engines have additional emissions technology – a diesel particulate filter – that removes soot as the exhaust passes through the exhaust system. The buses are 1,000 pounds lighter than their original design by using the smaller engine and a carbon steel frame that replaces a stainless steel frame.

 

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2 hours ago, Busjack said:

While I said it was a Seattle spec., you're correct that Huberman similarly cheapened the 4000s. A review of my search for "carbon steel" also turned up this Press Release (which also had the 3 for  4 lie):

 

Now it's all coming back full circle now, in retrospect he was wise to go that route but now the agency is stuck in purgatory in regards to the next fleet.   

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2 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

Now it's all coming back full circle now, in retrospect he was wise to go that route but now the agency is stuck in purgatory in regards to the next fleet.   

In the case of artics, maybe not, given at least the 67 purchased for the Dan Ryan Red Line rebuild, but of questionable need now, and CTA's inability to use artics on routes such as 79.

Back around 2008, they said that they bought the 4000s to replace 4 6000s with 3 4000s, and while that may have made sense for routes like 9, 49, and 77, people on this board said FG and 74th didn't have the lifts to service them.

At that time, CTA was also blowing money on fuel because it had committed to futures contracts just before the 2008 crash. Their chief financial officer said fuel was on budget at $3.08/gal. when it was going for something like $1.75.

Obviously, the current budget items to rehab 100 artics, but get 208 electric artics is motivated by the 208 4000s falling apart.

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16 minutes ago, Busjack said:

In the case of artics, maybe not, given at least the 67 purchased for the Dan Ryan Red Line rebuild, but of questionable need now, and CTA's inability to use artics on routes such as 79.

Back around 2008, they said that they bought the 4000s to replace 4 6000s with 3 4000s, and while that may have made sense for routes like 9, 49, and 77, people on this board said FG and 74th didn't have the lifts to service them.

At that time, CTA was also blowing money on fuel because it had committed to futures contracts just before the 2008 crash. Their chief financial officer said fuel was on budget at $3.08/gal. when it was going for something like $1.75.

Obviously, the current budget items to rehab 100 artics, but get 208 electric artics is motivated by the 208 4000s falling 

Yeah I remember the smoking mirrors that they were sending in regards to the replacement of #6000s and eventually #7500s. It makes sense when you explain it in that regard. Rather than investing in FG and 74th since 2008 to at least accommodate the facilities with 60 foot lifts among other components money theoretically was wasted in the long run that potentially could of been used somewhere else. Different times though have probably shifted my opinion a bit though. It's never to late the right the ship to all 7 garages accommodated with 60 foot lifts.

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2 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

Yeah I remember the smoking mirrors that they were sending in regards to the replacement of #6000s and eventually #7500s. It makes sense when you explain it in that regard. Rather than investing in FG and 74th since 2008 to at least accommodate the facilities with 60 foot lifts among other components money theoretically was wasted in the long run that potentially could of been used somewhere else. Different times though have probably shifted my opinion a bit though. It's never to late the right the ship to all 7 garages accommodated with 60 foot lifts.

Personally the monkey wrench is not having an 8th garage. I still say that 77th didn't work with artics because outside of 79, they couldn't convert whole lines to artics which is what SHOULD be done when artics are used. You'd either have to abolish the 250 bus limit or move work somewhere to make them work on say 4, 79 and 2 BUT there's no one that can take on 1, 24, 31, 43, 51, 52a, 53a to make that accomodation 

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1 hour ago, Sam92 said:

Personally the monkey wrench is not having an 8th garage. I still say that 77th didn't work with artics because outside of 79, they couldn't convert whole lines to artics which is what SHOULD be done when artics are used. You'd either have to abolish the 250 bus limit or move work somewhere to make them work on say 4, 79 and 2 BUT there's no one that can take on 1, 24, 31, 43, 51, 52a, 53a to make that accomodation 

77th could house 450 buses, but with 74th and 103rd being under 200 buses each, they moved some bus routes to those garages to even stuff out.

79 didn't work because they (at least on a couple of occasions) didn't convert the whole line and the artic would get bunched behind a 40-footer.

Anyway, the whole garage situation is to be reappraised as part of the electric transition plan, and 77, NP, and FG will undoubtedly need to be replaced, but CTA has been saying that for about 25 years, off and on.

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33 minutes ago, Busjack said:

77th could house 450 buses, but with 74th and 103rd being under 200 buses each, they moved some bus routes to those garages to even stuff out.

79 didn't work because they (at least on a couple of occasions) didn't convert the whole line and the artic would get bunched behind a 40-footer.

Anyway, the whole garage situation is to be reappraised as part of the electric transition plan, and 77, NP, and FG will undoubtedly need to be replaced, but CTA has been saying that for about 25 years, off and on.

Who owns the former Beverly garage ?  If it's still CTA property ( which would be great,  but I kinda doubt that) it would be the perfect temporary garage while 77th is rebuilt  and then possibly 74th getting retrofitted or artics.  I could also envision 901 W North Ave being a temporary garage while North Park and FG get rebuilds.  

While the CTA could use an 8th garage, the city has been very slow to identify and competently bid to purchase a site while the amount of sites diminishes.  For instance,  38th and California is a better for a CTA garage than a "migrant tent camp."   There's vacant land on the former LeClaire Courts housing project at 44th and Cicero.  Certainly some land in Lincoln Yards could have been set aside for a CTA garage.

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1 hour ago, artthouwill said:

Who owns the former Beverly garage ?  If it's still CTA property ( which would be great,  but I kinda doubt that) it would be the perfect temporary garage while 77th is rebuilt  and then possibly 74th getting retrofitted or artics.  I could also envision 901 W North Ave being a temporary garage while North Park and FG get rebuilds.  

While the CTA could use an 8th garage, the city has been very slow to identify and competently bid to purchase a site while the amount of sites diminishes.  For instance,  38th and California is a better for a CTA garage than a "migrant tent camp."   There's vacant land on the former LeClaire Courts housing project at 44th and Cicero.  Certainly some land in Lincoln Yards could have been set aside for a CTA garage.

I'm not sure what the max was back in the 80s for Beverly Garage but realistically they could house 200-220 buses at best with a few modifications of the plotted land around it. I believe the CTA still owns the property while sharing it with CDOT.

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9 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

I'm not sure what the max was back in the 80s for Beverly Garage but realistically they could house 200-220 buses at best with a few modifications of the plotted land around it. I believe the CTA still owns the property while sharing it with CDOT.

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The perfect place for an eighth garage would be to buy & tear down all the slums north of Howard St. just east of the L yard & build a new Limits garage there.  The the 22, 36, 96, 97,  136, 147, 151, 155 & the Evanston 200s wouldn't have those long dead heads from North Park or Forest Glen.

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10 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

I'm not sure what the max was back in the 80s for Beverly Garage but realistically they could house 200-220 buses at best with a few modifications of the plotted land around it. I believe the CTA still owns the property while sharing it with CDOT.

 

CTA owns it, but as indicated by the vehicles in the picture, it is the non-revenue vehicle facility. There must have been something wrong with it, as it was comparatively new (built around 1949) when it was replaced by 103rd. Otherwise, the reason that Jeffrey buses had to move from 77th doesn't seem enough to justify 103rd, especially since closing Beverly hurt coverage on routes such as 49A, 52A, and 53A.

At one time, 77 had routes 6, 27, 28, and 29, so there's plenty of room there (between the 1902 and 1907 barns, about 450, as I said above).

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49 minutes ago, strictures said:

The perfect place for an eighth garage would be to buy & tear down all the slums north of Howard St. just east of the L yard & build a new Limits garage there.  The the 22, 36, 96, 97,  136, 147, 151, 155 & the Evanston 200s wouldn't have those long dead heads from North Park or Forest Glen.

It's one thing if you're advocating for a replacement garage for North Park,  but not sure if it works for an 8th garage.   But it's probably never going to happen. 

What I will say is that perhaps CTA should figure out a long-term plan for how many articulated buses it actually needs.   Then they can figure out where they make the most sense.   It's amazing that artics can work on Clark and not on 79th Street.  

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4 hours ago, artthouwill said:

What I will say is that perhaps CTA should figure out a long-term plan for how many articulated buses it actually needs.   Then they can figure out where they make the most sense. 

That seems to be the problem inherent in the 2024 budget. Aside from not amending the plan for the 7000s (CTA is not ordering 846 7000s plus 546 9000s), the capital plan assumes 1-1 replacements, especially on the 4000s and 4300s: 208 equivalent electric buses and rehab 100 buses. Similarly, on the 40-foot front, they are saying 500 Novas and 430 rehabs (actually that now is a decrease because the base order is now said to replace 6400s instead of 1000s, but there were only something like 10 6400s running near  the end, and 70 electric buses are also mentioned).

However, the last sentence indicates that CTA's historic practice has been to retire fewer buses than indicated, unless the decision is made to terminate a series, such as the New Looks in 1995. For instance, it was assumed that the 6400s would replace the MAN Americanas, but some lasted until replaced by NABIs (mostly assigned to K and 79th).

But, to get back to your point, instead of assuming 1-1, CTA should figure out where artics work and how many are needed to cover those routes. I don't know if the 42% spare ratio that was in the roster @andrethebusman99 posted in 2018 is still the case, but that would indicate that at that time, CTA had 80 excess artics (assuming a normal 16% spare ratio).

Edited by Busjack
redid numbers after finding original post
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8 hours ago, artthouwill said:

It's one thing if you're advocating for a replacement garage for North Park,  but not sure if it works for an 8th garage.   But it's probably never going to happen. 

What I will say is that perhaps CTA should figure out a long-term plan for how many articulated buses it actually needs.   Then they can figure out where they make the most sense.   It's amazing that artics can work on Clark and not on 79th Street.  

 

5 hours ago, Busjack said:

That seems to be the problem inherent in the 2024 budget. Aside from not amending the plan for the 7000s (CTA is not ordering 846 7000s plus 546 9000s), the capital plan assumes 1-1 replacements, especially on the 4000s and 4300s: 208 equivalent electric buses and rehab 100 buses. Similarly, on the 40-foot front, they are saying 500 Novas and 430 rehabs (actually that now is a decrease because the base order is now said to replace 6400s instead of 1000s, but there were only something like 10 6400s running near  the end, and 70 electric buses are also mentioned).

However, the last sentence indicates that CTA's historic practice has been to retire fewer buses than indicated, unless the decision is made to terminate a series, such as the New Looks in 1995. For instance, it was assumed that the 6400s would replace the MAN Americanas, but some lasted until replaced by NABIs (mostly assigned to K and 79th).

But, to get back to your point, instead of assuming 1-1, CTA should figure out where artics work and how many are needed to cover those routes. I don't know if the 42% spare ratio that was in the roster @andrethebusman99 posted in 2018 is still the case, but that would indicate that at that time, CTA had 80 excess artics (assuming a normal 16% spare ratio).

 

22 hours ago, Busjack said:

77th could house 450 buses, but with 74th and 103rd being under 200 buses each, they moved some bus routes to those garages to even stuff out.

79 didn't work because they (at least on a couple of occasions) didn't convert the whole line and the artic would get bunched behind a 40-footer.

Anyway, the whole garage situation is to be reappraised as part of the electric transition plan, and 77, NP, and FG will undoubtedly need to be replaced, but CTA has been saying that for about 25 years, off and on.

Imo they have the space to make 77th all artic. BUT run system wise they're at capacity; they have the least amount of routes but a lot of the routes they have are heavy and thus require a lot of "labor" and since each garage has only room for up to 1000 runs you still need to open a new garage to make space for that unless you instate 5 digit run numbers. 

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1 hour ago, Sam92 said:

 

 

Imo they have the space to make 77th all artic. BUT run system wise they're at capacity; they have the least amount of routes but a lot of the routes they have are heavy and thus require a lot of "labor" and since each garage has only room for up to 1000 runs you still need to open a new garage to make space for that unless you instate 5 digit run numbers. 

I'm sure the run numbers don't dictate anything. One can always put another digit in the run box, or, for instance, assign 7 and V run numbers to 77th/Vincennes.

What does make a difference is the length of the block (time or distance between when the bus leaves the garage), which the electrification consultants' say governs whether garage charging is sufficient or remote chargers are needed. The consultants preferred garage charging, but CTA seems to be headed in the other direction, by announcing a grant for 6 chargers at 95th, even though that's 3 miles from 103/Stony Island. On the other hand, if a transit authority has to shorten blocks, the consultants say more buses are needed.

Back to the articulated bus issue, NF announced that it increased the number of batteries in its 60-foot buses.

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16 hours ago, Busjack said:

CTA owns it, but as indicated by the vehicles in the picture, it is the non-revenue vehicle facility. There must have been something wrong with it, as it was comparatively new (built around 1949) when it was replaced by 103rd. Otherwise, the reason that Jeffrey buses had to move from 77th doesn't seem enough to justify 103rd, especially since closing Beverly hurt coverage on routes such as 49A, 52A, and 53A.

At one time, 77 had routes 6, 27, 28, and 29, so there's plenty of room there (between the 1902 and 1907 barns, about 450, as I said above).

Beverly was too small. Buses were parked on Loomis for years, later on the driveway between building and Vincennes south of 103rd and (until 95 and 100 were moved to 77th) things degenerated to parking ON Vincennes at night until at least one car rear ended a parked bus.

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Just now, andrethebusman99 said:

Beverly was too small. Buses were parked on Loomis for years, later on the driveway between building and Vincennes south of 103rd and (until 95 and 100 were moved to 77th) things degenerated to parking ON Vincennes at night until at least one car rear ended a parked bus.

Only place worse was 52nd where buses were regularly parked on Cottage in front of the Armory. After annex roof caved in from snow, part of 6 went to 77th and the whole place closed not long after.

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11 hours ago, andrethebusman99 said:

Only place worse was 52nd where buses were regularly parked on Cottage in front of the Armory. After annex roof caved in from snow, part of 6 went to 77th and the whole place closed not long after.

Which gets us back to the subject. I didn't live in Hyde Park long enough to see the roof collapse, but it didn't seem coincidental that the garage closed just about when Jeffery went artic.

The roster from 2018 you posted said that K was the most over capacity, and I asked at the time how it could house artics in that situation, and the only answer given here was that some were in the employees' parking lot. The (I assume unofficial) roster recently posted by @YoungBusLover seems to have K under control, but it sure looks like C now can't take any, and apparently they didn't work when they were on 66.

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11 minutes ago, Busjack said:

Which gets us back to the subject. I didn't live in Hyde Park long enough to see the roof collapse, but it didn't seem coincidental that the garage closed just about when Jeffery went artic.

The roster from 2018 you posted said that K was the most over capacity, and I asked at the time how it could house artics in that situation, and the only answer given here was that some were in the employees' parking lot. The (I assume unofficial) roster recently posted by @YoungBusLover seems to have K under control, but it sure looks like C now can't take any, and apparently they didn't work when they were on 66.

Now that you mentioned it,  I believe that CTA already had intentions to close 52nd garage when they received those artics.  The roof collapse indeed gave them a valid reason to cexpedite the closure but even without the collapse,  52nd didn't have the space to house  those artics, and the bulk of their work was the 6 and the 14.   Therefore the decision to close that garage was a simple one and 77th had ample space to absorb the new artics.

My question would be once 77th gets rebuilt,  will CTA  attempt to shrink the garages capacity and sell off excess land?  I think 77th needs to maintain its capacity even if some of it is unused.   It could come in handy in the electric bus future. The 103rd garage can't be the South Side's only artic capacity garage. 

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18 hours ago, Busjack said:

I'm sure the run numbers don't dictate anything. One can always put another digit in the run box, or, for instance, assign 7 and V run numbers to 77th/Vincennes.

What does make a difference is the length of the block (time or distance between when the bus leaves the garage), which the electrification consultants' say governs whether garage charging is sufficient or remote chargers are needed. The consultants preferred garage charging, but CTA seems to be headed in the other direction, by announcing a grant for 6 chargers at 95th, even though that's 3 miles from 103/Stony Island. On the other hand, if a transit authority has to shorten blocks, the consultants say more buses are needed.

Back to the articulated bus issue, NF announced that it increased the number of batteries in its 60-foot buses.

What I was point out was 77th now is still not at capacity (450 buses) but because the routes they have use so many drivers and runs you can't assign anymore work/runs to them cause all 1000 runs are used by the current routes.

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4 hours ago, artthouwill said:

...

My question would be once 77th gets rebuilt,  will CTA  attempt to shrink the garages capacity and sell off excess land?  I think 77th needs to maintain its capacity even if some of it is unused.   It could come in handy in the electric bus future. The 103rd garage can't be the South Side's only artic capacity garage. 

There was the attempt to sell off a lot near the strip shopping center and build a new employee lot in the dead lot that went nowhere. I'm sure that demand for land on 79th St. that needs remediation after 120 years of abuse isn't there. If you are thinking about Limits, North Ave., or Archer, there wasn't enough property to rebuild L and A, and while CTA gave N away as part of the L deal, I don't know what motivated CTA to leave N for C, when it had already moved operations back to Lawndale.

The only real question is that whether the facilities portion of the electrification plan has enough foresight to provide the necessary facilities, or whether CTA again would be as short-sighted as it was with 74th, which could have at least used artics on Ashland (and apparently was the impetus for the now-dead Fisk site).

4 hours ago, Sam92 said:

What I was point out was 77th now is still not at capacity (450 buses) but because the routes they have use so many drivers and runs you can't assign anymore work/runs to them cause all 1000 runs are used by the current routes.

Understood, but I pointed out why it was not a real constraint. Also, @andrethebusman99 and I pointed out that at various times, 77 had plenty of other routes (6, 14, 26, 27, 28, 29, 95W, 100), and it didn't seem to cause that problem. Apparently you think reprogramming stuff (which CTA couldn't do until about 2000)  is a real problem. In fact, it was thought a real leap in 1972 that CTA went from 3 roller to 4 roller windshield run boxes.

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5 hours ago, Busjack said:

There was the attempt to sell off a lot near the strip shopping center and build a new employee lot in the dead lot that went nowhere. I'm sure that demand for land on 79th St. that needs remediation after 120 years of abuse isn't there. If you are thinking about Limits, North Ave., or Archer, there wasn't enough property to rebuild L and A, and while CTA gave N away as part of the L deal, I don't know what motivated CTA to leave N for C, when it had already moved operations back to Lawndale.

The only real question is that whether the facilities portion of the electrification plan has enough foresight to provide the necessary facilities, or whether CTA again would be as short-sighted as it was with 74th, which could have at least used artics on Ashland (and apparently was the impetus for the now-dead Fisk site).

Understood, but I pointed out why it was not a real constraint. Also, @andrethebusman99 and I pointed out that at various times, 77 had plenty of other routes (6, 14, 26, 27, 28, 29, 95W, 100), and it didn't seem to cause that problem. Apparently you think reprogramming stuff (which CTA couldn't do until about 2000)  is a real problem. In fact, it was thought a real leap in 1972 that CTA went from 3 roller to 4 roller windshield run boxes.

Yeah I retrospect it's mainly a space thing and not a run thing because if you were to make 77th primarily artic to make them work on the routes it would be the same amount of buses but taking up 1.5x the space so I take back the run number issue. 

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Lawndale was always intended to be a temporary replacement for North. The plan was to build a new garage at North & Cicero, but "neighborhood activists" decided a shopping center was much more to their liking, and the city had some vacant land they had inherited from the CNW railroad that needed a new use, so Chicago Ave was hatched.

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8 hours ago, Busjack said:

There was the attempt to sell off a lot near the strip shopping center and build a new employee lot in the dead lot that went nowhere. I'm sure that demand for land on 79th St. that needs remediation after 120 years of abuse isn't there. If you are thinking about Limits, North Ave., or Archer, there wasn't enough property to rebuild L and A, and while CTA gave N away as part of the L deal, I don't know what motivated CTA to leave N for C, when it had already moved operations back to Lawndale.

The only real question is that whether the facilities portion of the electrification plan has enough foresight to provide the necessary facilities, or whether CTA again would be as short-sighted as it was with 74th, which could have at least used artics on Ashland (and apparently was the impetus for the now-dead Fisk site).

Understood, but I pointed out why it was not a real constraint. Also, @andrethebusman99 and I pointed out that at various times, 77 had plenty of other routes (6, 14, 26, 27, 28, 29, 95W, 100), and it didn't seem to cause that problem. Apparently you think reprogramming stuff (which CTA couldn't do until about 2000)  is a real problem. In fact, it was thought a real leap in 1972 that CTA went from 3 roller to 4 roller windshield run boxes.

Until 1959 CTA had four digit run numbers at 77th. Not a garage designation, but actual 4 digits. Yates-95th started with 1281 if I remember right, for instance.

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Part of the South Shops property was sold off for that store on 79th between Wentworth and Perry. The original shop property was bounded by 79th, Perry, 77th, Vincennes, with a lot of empty space used for storing dead streetcars until their turn in the bonfire east of Wentworth and track materials (and a bunch of old trailers used as sheds) between 78th and 79th west of Wentworth. Nothing had to be torn down to build the New Shop in 1961.

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