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2014 CTA Holiday Bus


Kevin

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From the registration on the photo on the Time Out website it is 4336.

http://www.timeout.com/chicago/blog/cta-releases-holiday-train-schedule

Well I've learned you have extra knowledge on these things, so sounds like we have a winner. One question that pops to my mind is whether they'll let the rims remain white after December. This is the first CTA bus since the Americanas to have white rims as far as I can remember.

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That is a beautiful sight for the holiday season! So bright and cheerful!!! I hope the passengers don't destroy the decorations inside or outside...

Nice shot, Kevin!!! :)

Given that they're going to have picture opportunities for the kids very likely with a bus riding Santa, it's a good chance people will be well enough behaved not to do anything damaging to the interior. It might sound cliche, but how many Christmas displays in general do you here about getting deliberately damaged? So let's have a bit more faith in people during this time of year than that.

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Given that they're going to have picture opportunities for the kids very likely with a bus riding Santa, it's a good chance people will be well enough behaved not to do anything damaging to the interior. It might sound cliche, but how many Christmas displays in general do you here about getting deliberately damaged? So let's have a bit more faith in people during this time of year than that.

I absolutely love Christmastime, jajuan. Bright, colorful lights, beautiful celebratory music, great friends and family getting together... but I feel like we can't celebrate it like years past....

  • We put Christmas music up on the radio at our stores, and we get complaints from some customers!!!
  • We can't wish our patrons "Merry Christmas", we have to say "Happy Holidays". I was raised to say "Merry Christmas" and should be able to say that. To me, that is the holiday coming up after Thanksgiving. I know there's Hanukkah and Kwanzaa, but Christmas is special to me, and I feel like I should be able to say it. There's a Jewel up on Howard in Evanston(2485) and they can't even play Christmas music in there because of the Jewish community. Does that sound right? True story if you never visited it.... that is the only Jewel in the area that has a Rabbi on premises and two Chef's Kitchens, two Bake Shops and two Meat Markets and Pier 14's(one regular, one kosher).

There are those out there(like less than 10-15% of the population) that will scrooge up the holiday for you. It's those that concern me about destroying equipment like Christmas-themed buses or trains(look at the 5000's and how some went from brand spankin' new to graffiti-tagged messes). I think that those responsible for that could care less if it's a regular vehicle or a Christmas-themed vehicle. It's the people in this percentage that concern me the most. I want the Christmas bus to look as majestic as it did yesterday as it does it's final day of operations on December 23rd.

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Given that they're going to have picture opportunities for the kids very likely with a bus riding Santa, it's a good chance people will be well enough behaved not to do anything damaging to the interior. It might sound cliche, but how many Christmas displays in general do you here about getting deliberately damaged? So let's have a bit more faith in people during this time of year than that.

On your second sentence, remember all the Mangers at the Churches that had the Jesus baby stolen?

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The CTA website lists the routes that Ralphie will be joining:

12/2-3: J14

12/4-5: 62

12/6 & 9: 3

12/10-11: 12

12/12-13: 66

12/17-18: 56

12/19-20: 22

12/22: 124

12/23: 49

At least one route from every garage gets represented. The question concerning routes 62 and 56 is whether 74th and FG will actually operate them seeing as though they have no artics. In other words, would a K operator operate the 62 and a NP operator operate the 56? That would probably mean the 49 will be operated by NP/

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On your second sentence, remember all the Mangers at the Churches that had the Jesus baby stolen?

And the point is, how often do we even hear of stories like that? Not very often. So my point stands. Let's actually let the service play itself out before we start predicting or entertaining possibilities of anything damage being done. How long has the Holiday Train been done now with little or no damage? And on a train you got a lot more surface area covered to be concerned about. If the Holiday Train can make it through all these years with very little incident. Don't you think that maybe, just maybe a bus with much less surface area covered in decorations can actually make it through with similar success? And I think we established operating a grocery store chain is a lot different from operating a transit agency.

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I absolutely love Christmastime, jajuan. Bright, colorful lights, beautiful celebratory music, great friends and family getting together... but I feel like we can't celebrate it like years past....

  • We put Christmas music up on the radio at our stores, and we get complaints from some customers!!!
  • We can't wish our patrons "Merry Christmas", we have to say "Happy Holidays". I was raised to say "Merry Christmas" and should be able to say that. To me, that is the holiday coming up after Thanksgiving. I know there's Hanukkah and Kwanzaa, but Christmas is special to me, and I feel like I should be able to say it. There's a Jewel up on Howard in Evanston(2485) and they can't even play Christmas music in there because of the Jewish community. Does that sound right? True story if you never visited it.... that is the only Jewel in the area that has a Rabbi on premises and two Chef's Kitchens, two Bake Shops and two Meat Markets and Pier 14's(one regular, one kosher).

There are those out there(like less than 10-15% of the population) that will scrooge up the holiday for you. It's those that concern me about destroying equipment like Christmas-themed buses or trains(look at the 5000's and how some went from brand spankin' new to graffiti-tagged messes). I think that those responsible for that could care less if it's a regular vehicle or a Christmas-themed vehicle. It's the people in this percentage that concern me the most. I want the Christmas bus to look as majestic as it did yesterday as it does it's final day of operations on December 23rd.

I'm not going to get in that Merry Christmas vs Happy Holidays debate other than to say I don't think it's a set company wide policy at Jewel where you absolutely have to say Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas because I go to too many where the employees say Merry Christmas with no incident. That's pretty much a matter of knowing the customer base. Some stores you might hear Happy Holidays intermixed with Merry Christmas because the store is in an area with a mix of cultures and heritages. One thing I do wish people would stop doing though is taking the fact that their employer is being mindful that they serve a customer base of several cultures as the employer saying they can't still hold their own holiday as being special. As for the 2485 Evanston Jewel-Osco, one has to wonder it that store being relatively close to the strong Jewish presence in Rogers Park and West Rogers Park that's concentrated within a half mile and less of the Chicago-Evanston border plays a role to that store having a strong Jewish influence.

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At least one route from every garage gets represented. The question concerning routes 62 and 56 is whether 74th and FG will actually operate them seeing as though they have no artics. In other words, would a K operator operate the 62 and a NP operator operate the 56? That would probably mean the 49 will be operated by NP/

I'm wondering would they even station an artic bus at those garages as FG don't have the facility to maintain artics. They could very easily station the bus at K, 7 and NP for the entire month. But maybe if they want to show it off at the garages then maybe not.
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I'm wondering would they even station an artic bus at those garages as FG don't have the facility to maintain artics. They could very easily station the bus at K, 7 and NP for the entire month. But maybe if they want to show it off at the garages then maybe not.

Well the O'Hare shuttles after Miss Fall Asleep at the Controls whacked the escalators and stairways showed that artics could be parked at FG at least temporarily.

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Given that they're going to have picture opportunities for the kids very likely with a bus riding Santa, it's a good chance people will be well enough behaved not to do anything damaging to the interior. It might sound cliche, but how many Christmas displays in general do you here about getting deliberately damaged? So let's have a bit more faith in people during this time of year than that.

Isn't cliche that someone steals the infant from the Daley Center creche, just like someone always steals the toy donation box at some church or charity and then good Samaritans come up with 3 times as much?

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I'm wondering would they even station an artic bus at those garages as FG don't have the facility to maintain artics. They could very easily station the bus at K, 7 and NP for the entire month. But maybe if they want to show it off at the garages then maybe not.

If I were placing bets, it probably will stay at a home base and inside. I don't think they want the couple of inches of ice on it that would have been deposited tonight. However, like when they had the RTS candy cane bus, I won't look too good with slush all over it.

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Isn't cliche that someone steals the infant from the Daley Center creche, just like someone always steals the toy donation box at some church or charity and then good Samaritans come up with 3 times as much?


And I still say let's actually see the service unfold this year before the conclusions that it's a given that something unwanted is going to happen to or on the bus because it's still interesting, as I pointed out that the Holiday train is a success still after all these years and you got more surface area decorated on the train than is covered in a 60 foot bus.
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I'm wondering would they even station an artic bus at those garages as FG don't have the facility to maintain artics. They could very easily station the bus at K, 7 and NP for the entire month. But maybe if they want to show it off at the garages then maybe not.

We may not know what garage is operating it.... it may have a special run number like "1225", "NOEL", "HOHO", "XMAS". As T8H5307A proved in the past, you can program these buses to display anything...

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I'm wondering would they even station an artic bus at those garages as FG don't have the facility to maintain artics. They could very easily station the bus at K, 7 and NP for the entire month. But maybe if they want to show it off at the garages then maybe not.

Becuase artics wont go to FG unless they build a new maintenance facitlity which dosent look like its happening!

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We may not know what garage is operating it.... it may have a special run number like "1225", "NOEL", "HOHO", "XMAS". As T8H5307A proved in the past, you can program these buses to display anything...

I sort of doubt HOHO for other reasons. And, for reasons I have stated before, NOEL should hang out at the Apostolic Church of God, which believes in No L, but isn't scheduled to do so.

I figure that they would have to program it through the Clever Device, but considering it has a special symbol on BusTracker, that shouldn't be too hard. I also doubt that Mr. CTA is going to say "this is run K716" as opposed to one of your numbers.

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I sort of doubt HOHO for other reasons. And, for reasons I have stated before, NOEL should hang out at the Apostolic Church of God, which believes in No L, but isn't scheduled to do so.

I figure that they would have to program it through the Clever Device, but considering it has a special symbol on BusTracker, that shouldn't be too hard. I also doubt that Mr. CTA is going to say "this is run K716" as opposed to one of your numbers.

I know L trains have the capability to announce run numbers, but I didn't realize that buses could do that too.

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I know L trains have the capability to announce run numbers, but I didn't realize that buses could do that too.

They usually do about once every 15 minutes, as indicated (also on the visual screen). I don't know if that is a "customer service" feature, in case you want to rat on the driver, or to tell lost and found on what bus you lost your diamond tiara.

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