Neighbors Rally To Bring Back The #11 Cuts

[BusHunter]

Found this story on DNA.info, seems the Alderman and residents are rallying to bring back the #11 in Lincoln Square and other various neighborhoods affected by the cut of it a few years back. I personally feel it gets more riders than the 35th extension and that was made permanent. Here's the story... (It's in post two)

[BusHunter]

http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20140716/lincoln-square/no-11-lincoln-bus-campaign-aims-bring-back-route-axed-by-cta

[MetroShadow]

The question is: whether or not these people will ride it as promised, or are willing to just deal with ridiculously long headways?

[Busjack]

Found this story on DNA.info, seems the Alderman and residents are rallying to bring back the #11 in Lincoln Square and other various neighborhoods affected by the cut of it a few years back. I personally feel it gets more riders than the 35th extension and that was made permanent. Here's the story... (It's in post two)

You'll also note that Claypool immediately brushed them off.* Let's see if Pawar has more cojones this time.

Let's also see if Emanuel changes his style now that polling indicates that it is not going over so well, but I wouldn't count on that.

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*At least according to the link that was originally on the home page. Maybe it was this RedEye article.

[sw4400]

This is wishful thinking, but I won't give my hopes up for the return of the #11 between Western and Fullerton. CTA should've just left well enough alone, IMO. A lot of businesses between this area were impacted to where some had to close or struggle now to make ends meet. But I'm not going to reopen old wounds here... we all know about all this. Bottom line, we could sign a petition that's 1,000,000 pages long with stories about how cutting service impacted businesses in the area, and CTA will just basically say "Oh well. Take the Brown Line or walk, those are your options...."

[jajuan]

And that's pretty much it in a nutshell. All the businesses, the residents, and even an alderman for one of the areas affected by that particular cut laid down valid points of why that cut was downright stupid and had nothing to do with low ridership as Claypool claimed and Emanuel gladly signed on to. But Claypool pretty much told all involved, "Yeah, yeah. This is still how it's going to be and you can all take a hike if you don't like it." If those lakefront residents couldn't save the 145 or get Claypool or Emanuel to compromise on keeping express bus service on Wilson during rush hour at the very least (everyone was so gung ho with jumping on the take the 78 bandwagon) after they waited practically until the last minute to reveal to the public the final form a lot of those cuts would take, don't hold your breaths on the 11 coming back soon as long as those two are both still in their respective positions. As it is, Emanuel already got lucky with one hurdle by virtue of Cook County Board President Tori Preckwinkle deciding not to run for mayor when if the polls are correct she would have given him a credible serious challenge with a possibility, according to some of those polls, of beating him.

[Busjack]

..As it is, Emanuel already got lucky with one hurdle by virtue of Cook County Board President Tori Preckwinkle deciding not to run for mayor when if the polls are correct she would have given him a credible serious challenge with a possibility, according to some of those polls, of beating him.

The question essentially is whether Emanuel has sufficiently teed off the north side with transit issues or the south and west sides with school and violence issues. Probably not enough to get unelected at this point, unless people concur with the "man on the street" on WGN who said "I'm for Karen Lewis to burn it down, because what the city needs is to burn it down, go broke, and start from scratch."

Maybe more interesting was a Sun-Times piece on whether a New York progressive movement could make it here. While Blasio seems to be a similar "burn it down" candidate, the point made there that the alderman shouldn't all be rubber stamps has merits. Again, it gets back down to whether Pawar has grown a pair.

However, until such times as it happens, all one is going to get is Claypool's dismissive response. As one of the articles points out, a reasonable explanation for that cut still hasn't been given. If the rationale is "parallel" L service, 24, 29, and 56 should have been cut, too.

[BusHunter]

Like the article says "It is a long shot" but the idea is to put pressure on them to maybe bring it back. If they continue to rally for it in a "we're not going to go away" stance it might be possible it will eventually come back, and whose to say it might not become a political issue. If they can have service on west 31st, then they should get service here. We may think all hope is lost, but if enough people can get behind this, it may become an issue and their voice will be heard.

[Busjack]

.... If they can have service on west 31st, then they should get service here. ...

Issue on West 31st was that there was nothing south of 26th to the river. I'm sure the argument here, like on most diagonal streets, is that one can ride on the cross street.

However, you may have stumbled on maybe how things are done here--people complain enough and someone applies for a JARC, or in the Ashland case, cancel the X9 (and X49, since it was a Western Corridor grant) and get $5 million of useless planning money. Maybe tell Pawar and Quigley to go in that direction.