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7900-series Nova LFS - Updates


South Shop 7

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Well it helps to get some inside info on the who what and wheres. I wish I had a steadier video though. Maybe I need to look for a program to steady these videos.

YouTube normally has a built in software that helps to steady the shaking. I used a few times when uploading videos of singing performances that had a bit of shaking from trying to hold my smartphone steady while trying to keep from blocking other folks' view of the performer.

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Well I guess I was wrong about them going to 74th 1st lol but hey I'm glad theyre in service now, my guess as to why Chicago got them 1st probably similar to what they did with the pink line getting the 5000's. The pink line only needed about a good 44 cars to fill that line and the same with the 7900's, out the 3 potential garages to get them 74th, Chicago, and Forest Glen, Chicago has the least amount of Novas so I guess they decided to fill that garage with the new Novas 1st.

. I Had A Feeling About Where The 7900s Were Gonna Be Assigned. My First Opinion Was Chicago Garage, Second Was 74th Garage, & Last Was Forest Glen. It Makes Sense For Them To Have Em On Routes That Head To Downtown Though.
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. I Had A Feeling About Where The 7900s Were Gonna Be Assigned. My First Opinion Was Chicago Garage, Second Was 74th Garage, & Last Was Forest Glen. It Makes Sense For Them To Have Em On Routes That Head To Downtown Though.

Did you forget that #56 Milwaukee goes through Downtown?

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Yeah I've been looking. Iphone has an app that steadies the shot. Unfortunately this is from a samsung galaxy phone. The YouTube app seems to blur the shot.

Yeah that's probably a function of the YouTube app simultaneously moving to also bring items farther away into better focus when it steadies any shaking in your shot. But speaking of dumping grounds though, when the 7900s increase to a big enough number that should put an end to 74th running the 44, 48, and 94 with virtually nothing but 6400s during the weekdays one way or another. The only time 44 and 94 seem to see anything besides the old Novas is during weekend service. The 75 is another frequent 6400 dumping ground.

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So if the buses do indeed go to Chicago first and all signs are pointing to that. (first test and garage stop tour) How do you think they'll go about retiring the #6400's? Actually the Chicago #6500's are not bad and could hang around longer maybe at 74th or FG. What really needs to go are the 77th #6400's. Those are pretty much shot. Maybe that's what they intend to do is split up the #6500's to retire the #6400's. Just don't do nothing with #6445, which I haven't really seen since it left 77th.

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Maybe there will be a shifting around of higher numbered older Novas as the 7900s come in since indications seem to be that 77th will be holding on to New Flyers for a while since they did all those moves just recently to shed that garage of first generation model Novas.

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Every time a series is going extinct, the "better" examples get moved around a bunch. Example of 4000's at Forest Glen in their last days to replace 9800's that were going a bit earlier.

That sounds like they could replace amber LED Novas as well in a limited scale. Personally I think those should go last. These flip dot signs you can't see at night (not backlit either) and the bus can really sneak up on someone in a dark area like by a park or cemetery.

One thing I want to say about today's #7900's ride is that they need to work on those rear doors. The #1000's are vapor doors and when you just put your hand close to the sensor they trip and the door opens effortlessly. On today's ride with #7900, it didn't appear to have the door trip to open or the pressure was weak or something. Also a possible sensor could need adjustment or realignment too cause it wasn't tripping. Kind of like the #4000's initial problem, but everyone can open these doors with effort. The door was kind of heavy. I don't know if that's a design fault or what. Maybe I'm just spoiled on the NF's rear door system. :P

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So if the buses do indeed go to Chicago first and all signs are pointing to that. (first test and garage stop tour) How do you think they'll go about retiring the #6400's? Actually the Chicago #6500's are not bad and could hang around longer maybe at 74th or FG. What really needs to go are the 77th #6400's. Those are pretty much shot. Maybe that's what they intend to do is split up the #6500's to retire the #6400's. Just don't do nothing with #6445, which I haven't really seen since it left 77th.

This is my speculation if Chicago is the first to get the 7900's first regarding retirements and shuffling of Novas...

  • The 6400's that are in good operable condition will be shifted to 74th and Forest Glen. The rest will be scrapped, which will be on a bus by bus inspection.
  • 74th will get the 7900's next, retiring the 6400's that are in below fair condition. The rest will get shipped to Forest Glen. This will move 6876-6883 to there, giving all LED 6400's to FG and temporarily expanding the fleet there to near 300 buses(right now they sit at about 252, so I could see it spiking to 275-290).
  • Forest Glen will get the 7900's finally, retiring the Flip-Dot 6400's there. The option, if exercised, will retire the LED 6400's(6709-6883).This won't probably occur until sometime in 2015 however as the option has yet-to-be exercised for the 150 extra Smart Buses. The roster at Forest Glen upon retirement of all 6400-Series Novas will drop back down to around 230-245)

This presumes that Chicago gets the 7900's first, then 74th and finally Forest Glen, in that order.

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Who knows they might surprise us with Chicago NF's headed to FG. What's 84 new buses to them, three months? If they are at issue with north side garages having rehabbed NF's these higher C NF's will not be needing rehab that soon. Also with the recent theme being buses with more seats, they could send longitudinal seat buses there as a place with lower ridership and not needing the extra seats anyway. Regardless FG will be getting something non #6400 this year. Would be nice to have a few new buses for the Cubs games though.

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Every time a series is going extinct, the "better" examples get moved around a bunch. Example of 4000's at Forest Glen in their last days to replace 9800's that were going a bit earlier.

Yes true. (And he's speaking of the MAN 4000s for those who didn't figure it out, so need to wrack your brains of when FG ever had artic buses recently. They didn't :lol: ) To extend your example, the other side of that was remaining former 69th/74th, Kedzie and 103rd MAN 4000s eventually making their way to North Park where that series died out. Though some of those former 69th/74th and 103rd 4000s were the FG ones when the last 9800s went out of service.

Who knows they might surprise us with Chicago NF's headed to FG. What's 84 new buses to them, three months? If they are at issue with north side garages having rehabbed NF's these higher C NF's will not be needing rehab that soon. Also with the recent theme being buses with more seats, they could send longitudinal seat buses there as a place with lower ridership and not needing the extra seats anyway. Regardless FG will be getting something non #6400 this year. Would be nice to have a few new buses for the Cubs games though.

Yeah FG will get something non 6400, but I still don't see Chicago as being the sole source of buses if CTA decides to send NF 1000s back there. You make logical arguments but I just don't see Chicago becoming mostly or all Nova to keep FG from remaining so when the fleet as a whole has 1,030 NF 1000 series buses.

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This is my speculation if Chicago is the first to get the 7900's first regarding retirements and shuffling of Novas...

  • The 6400's that are in good operable condition will be shifted to 74th and Forest Glen. The rest will be scrapped, which will be on a bus by bus inspection.
  • 74th will get the 7900's next, retiring the 6400's that are in below fair condition. The rest will get shipped to Forest Glen. This will move 6876-6883 to there, giving all LED 6400's to FG and temporarily expanding the fleet there to near 300 buses(right now they sit at about 252, so I could see it spiking to 275-290).
  • Forest Glen will get the 7900's finally, retiring the Flip-Dot 6400's there. The option, if exercised, will retire the LED 6400's(6709-6883).This won't probably occur until sometime in 2015 however as the option has yet-to-be exercised for the 150 extra Smart Buses. The roster at Forest Glen upon retirement of all 6400-Series Novas will drop back down to around 230-245)

This presumes that Chicago gets the 7900's first, then 74th and finally Forest Glen, in that order.

If Chicago is first, I think the emphasis will be mainly on retiring out the worst condition 6400 series buses. It anything does shift out of those 1st Gen Novas at Chicago, it'll quite possibly be a small handful. And I highly doubt FG's bus count drops back down without giving the 76 back up again. One thing you forgot is that FG's bus count increased because it needed more to take on the 76 from Chicago as of the start of this spring pick, It was not because of FG becoming all Nova as you appear to be assuming. Along that same thought, FG will not be seeing a fleet increase unless somewhere down the line it takes on another relatively bus route as it recently did the 76 because again the increase in buses has nothing to do with the garage being all Nova and everything to do with its need for buses to operate the 76.

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The only reports of more than one being in CTA possession was back when 7900 first got here and a member who works at 77th said that 7900 and 7901 were spotted parked down at the South Shops. This was before we had photographic evidence of 7900's existence. However, 7900 is the only one so far ever photographed and confirmed actually seen out on the road by several members. So most of us were wondering if the sighting of 7901 at the Shops was in fact something else.

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I thought it was posted that 3 7900s were delivered, but only 7900 has been spotted on the street. Assuming the other two are still around, could they assign one to FG and one to 74th?

I heard that rumor too, that's why I initially put 7900, 7901 and 7902 as on property, but with only 7900 appearing, I took 7901 and 7902 off the roster for the moment.

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I heard that rumor too, that's why I initially put 7900, 7901 and 7902 as on property, but with only 7900 appearing, I took 7901 and 7902 off the roster for the moment.

Database still shows only 2 payments on one bus. Based on payments, there is still a partially completed bus at Nova, but it hasn't gotten past that stage.

As others pointed out, whoever posted 7901 lost his credibility, and nobody that I know of ever posted 7902. Press events were only 7900.

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To clarify my above point, the original poster about a prototype being here came up with the photographic evidence about 7900, which by the way was before all the press events, but there's never been any confirmed sights or photos of 7901.

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This is my speculation if Chicago is the first to get the 7900's first regarding retirements and shuffling of Novas...

  • The 6400's that are in good operable condition will be shifted to 74th and Forest Glen. The rest will be scrapped, which will be on a bus by bus inspection.
  • 74th will get the 7900's next, retiring the 6400's that are in below fair condition. The rest will get shipped to Forest Glen. This will move 6876-6883 to there, giving all LED 6400's to FG and temporarily expanding the fleet there to near 300 buses(right now they sit at about 252, so I could see it spiking to 275-290).
  • Forest Glen will get the 7900's finally, retiring the Flip-Dot 6400's there. The option, if exercised, will retire the LED 6400's(6709-6883).This won't probably occur until sometime in 2015 however as the option has yet-to-be exercised for the 150 extra Smart Buses. The roster at Forest Glen upon retirement of all 6400-Series Novas will drop back down to around 230-245)

This presumes that Chicago gets the 7900's first, then 74th and finally Forest Glen, in that order.

So, IF (Key word: IF) Chicago Garage gets these buses first, then that would speed up shifting and retirement of the 6400s?

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So, IF (Key word: IF) Chicago Garage gets these buses first, then that would speed up shifting and retirement of the 6400s?

The only thing that seems constant is that the worst ones are retired first.^ Also, basically, since the base order is 300 buses, more than likely the flip dot ones will be gone in a year.

Only real issue is whether they would be shuffling potential junk around garages until they are deep into deliveries, which has happened before.

___________

*The real fooler the last time was that even though the 5300s were not rehabbed, and all public pronouncements, such as which buses would get the Mr. CTA announcements, was that they would be retired first, the last of the 5300s outlasted the 4400s and 5800s.

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