7000-series - Delivery & Updates

[MTRSP1900-CTA3200]

I went to Boston in the summer of last year and was hoping to catch a ride on the new CRRC cars, but a set of them had derailed in March I believe and they were all out of service because of that. According to the Boston Globe they had defective side bearer pads that contributed to the derailment.

18 hours ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Btwn this & WMATA, the last quiet and issue-free rolling stock delivery had to have been Miami-Dade's in 2017. No one heard about that one

Los Angeles and any transit agency that has taken delivery of Siemens S70/S700s would like to have a word with you.  Though they are light rail vehicles.

[Busjack]

21 hours ago, strictures said:

The CRRC cars for the CTA are being built in Chicago, so I assume the CTA has people in the plant observing & making sure they're being built to the correct specs, unlike the 5000s, which had garbage truck castings from China, from a company that had never cast rail trucks before. 

Your first point is essentially correct. Just about all the contracts have a provision that inspectors reporting to the transit authority have to be on site. The problems with the Bombardier trucks and welding were discovered by CTA inspectors.

[rvwnsd]

On 8/5/2022 at 1:02 PM, chicagocubs6323 said:

 

The production cars made their first day of service on the Blue Line August 2nd.  Video premieres at 7pm tonight!

Nice video of some beautiful railcars. Reminds me of five and a half year old me riding the 2200s with my dad on opening day of the Kennedy Extension. Sadly, both the 2200's and my dad are gone, but the memory lives on. 

Thanks for posting this, @chicagocubs6323

[NewFlyerMCI]

18 hours ago, MTRSP1900-CTA3200 said:

I went to Boston in the summer of last year and was hoping to catch a ride on the new CRRC cars, but a set of them had derailed in March I believe and they were all out of service because of that. According to the Boston Globe they had defective side bearer pads that contributed to the derailment.

Los Angeles and any transit agency that has taken delivery of Siemens S70/S700s would like to have a word with you.  Though they are light rail vehicles.

My bad, I was specifically referring to heavy rail/rapid transit rolling stock. Outside of delivery delays, I can’t pinpoint any issue any light rail system has had with new rolling stock in the last decade. Although as I type this up, I feel as though I vaguely remember something involving MUNI, but I digress

[Tcmetro]

Not the US, but Ottawa has had a ton of problems with their new light rail line, including a fair amount of rolling stock issues.

[artthouwill]

On 8/6/2022 at 10:32 PM, jackathan said:

Sadly. Budd Company railcars are a dying breed, plus if CTA makes the same mistake like the MBTA where they scrapped half of the #12 type cars while #14 type cars have issues (also made by CRRC), we're doomed. I guarantee you that the 7000-series will be lemons given how frequent the #4 and #14 cars on the MBTA were recalled.

If 10 cars a week were delivered, it would take almost 10 months for CRRC to complete the delivery of the first 400 cars of the 7000s.   That would mean the 2600s would be around until June, 2023.  With all sorts of things going on,  10 cars a week seems like a lofty goal.  Maybe we should be hopeful that 4 or 6 cars get delivered a week. 

When the 7000s come in earnest,  it will be interesting to see which of the 2600s get removed from service.   Will that be based on cars in shops?  Will it be based in age? Will it be based on miles?  Will it be based on lines, since the 2600s are also on the Brown and Orange Lines?  Will the Blue Line send 3200s back to Brown and Orange Lines to replace their 2600s?

Then the big question is what line gets 7000s after the Blue Line is completely filled with 7000s? 

[cta5658]

5 hours ago, artthouwill said:

If 10 cars a week were delivered, it would take almost 10 months for CRRC to complete the delivery of the first 400 cars of the 7000s.   That would mean the 2600s would be around until June, 2023.  With all sorts of things going on,  10 cars a week seems like a lofty goal.  Maybe we should be hopeful that 4 or 6 cars get delivered a week. 

When the 7000s come in earnest,  it will be interesting to see which of the 2600s get removed from service.   Will that be based on cars in shops?  Will it be based in age? Will it be based on miles?  Will it be based on lines, since the 2600s are also on the Brown and Orange Lines?  Will the Blue Line send 3200s back to Brown and Orange Lines to replace their 2600s?

Then the big question is what line gets 7000s after the Blue Line is completely filled with 7000s? 

My guess, either the Brown or Orange Line

[artthouwill]

1 minute ago, cta5658 said:

My guess, either the Brown or Orange Line

The Orange Line might be a good idea as maybe 88 cars would be needed.  With 312 on the Blue Line and 88 on the Orange,  that would make 400. If the Blue needs more cars, say 320, that might eliminate the Orange Line and makes Purple Line with 66 and Yellow Line with12 ab option.  Pink Line count be another option with  56 * 40 for itself plus 16 for supplemental Blue Line service).  This assumes CTA-s ybqukkubfbwss to run mixed fleets 

To me, the 3200s have to run somewhere so the Brown and Orange Lines are the most logical and doesn't require a mixed fleet except for compatability with 2600s.  For me, that leaves Pink,  Purple,  and Yellow.   The only problem with Purple and Yellow is that CTA would be forced to separate their fleets from Red at Howard  

Now if CTA exercises any options before the completion of the base order, that changes everything    If Orange Line gets the remainder of the base order, then an option exercise makes Brown Line rge favorite to receive the option cars. Brown and Orange need to be interchangeable in the event they need to run as one line.  But yes,  Orange seems like the next in line for the 7000s.

[Busjack]

1 hour ago, artthouwill said:

The Orange Line might be a good idea as maybe 88 cars would be needed.  With 312 on the Blue Line and 88 on the Orange,  that would make 400. If the Blue needs more cars, say 320, that might eliminate the Orange Line ...  This assumes CTA-s ybqukkubfbwss to run mixed fleets 

....

Now if CTA exercises any options before the completion of the base order, that changes everything    If Orange Line gets the remainder of the base order, then an option exercise makes Brown Line rge favorite to receive the option cars. Brown and Orange need to be interchangeable in the event they need to run as one line.  But yes,  Orange seems like the next in line for the 7000s.

@artthouwill, first check your phone before you hit Submit, as the phone is getting goofy.

The intent of the first 656 was to replace 400 2600s and 256 3200s.  The question is whether that's enough to take care of demand out of Forest Park, Rosemont, Midway, and Kimball yards, or there  are more than 400 2600s in service.

There's no reason to believe that planning is not being done in view of exercising the options up to 656. Thus, except for incidental stuff like the sending of a couple of 5000s to 54th for the Blue Line, I don't see messing with the fleets at Howard, Linden, 98, 63, 54, and Harlem.

 

[Bus1883]

7 hours ago, artthouwill said:

If 10 cars a week were delivered, it would take almost 10 months for CRRC to complete the delivery of the first 400 cars of the 7000s.   That would mean the 2600s would be around until June, 2023.  With all sorts of things going on,  10 cars a week seems like a lofty goal.  Maybe we should be hopeful that 4 or 6 cars get delivered a week. 

When the 7000s come in earnest,  it will be interesting to see which of the 2600s get removed from service.   Will that be based on cars in shops?  Will it be based in age? Will it be based on miles?  Will it be based on lines, since the 2600s are also on the Brown and Orange Lines?  Will the Blue Line send 3200s back to Brown and Orange Lines to replace their 2600s?

Then the big question is what line gets 7000s after the Blue Line is completely filled with 7000s? 

My opinion is if 10 cars get delivered each month we could have around 120 this year into early next year, 240 next year into 2024, 360 with the last extra 40 cars in 2024 into 2025. Deliveries could be completed in 2025 or less for the base order if they deliver 12-14 cars each month until late 2024. 

[garmon757]

6 hours ago, artthouwill said:

The Orange Line might be a good idea as maybe 88 cars would be needed.  With 312 on the Blue Line and 88 on the Orange,  that would make 400. If the Blue needs more cars, say 320, that might eliminate the Orange Line and makes Purple Line with 66 and Yellow Line with12 ab option.  Pink Line count be another option with  56 * 40 for itself plus 16 for supplemental Blue Line service).  This assumes CTA-s ybqukkubfbwss to run mixed fleets 

To me, the 3200s have to run somewhere so the Brown and Orange Lines are the most logical and doesn't require a mixed fleet except for compatability with 2600s.  For me, that leaves Pink,  Purple,  and Yellow.   The only problem with Purple and Yellow is that CTA would be forced to separate their fleets from Red at Howard  

Now if CTA exercises any options before the completion of the base order, that changes everything    If Orange Line gets the remainder of the base order, then an option exercise makes Brown Line rge favorite to receive the option cars. Brown and Orange need to be interchangeable in the event they need to run as one line.  But yes,  Orange seems like the next in line for the 7000s.

 

4 hours ago, Busjack said:

@artthouwill, first check your phone before you hit Submit, as the phone is getting goofy.

The intent of the first 656 was to replace 400 2600s and 256 3200s.  The question is whether that's enough to take care of demand out of Forest Park, Rosemont, Midway, and Kimball yards, or there  are more than 400 2600s in service.

There's no reason to believe that planning is not being done in view of exercising the options up to 656. Thus, except for incidental stuff like the sending of a couple of 5000s to 54th for the Blue Line, I don't see messing with the fleets at Howard, Linden, 98, 63, 54, and Harlem.

 

The first 400 cars are slated to be strictly assigned to the Blue Line. There’s a possibility that the remaining 3200s from the Blue can return back to Brown and Orange Lines to fill the yard capacities respectively while the process of scrapping 2600s can begin without being short on trains at Kimball and Midway yards. By the time RPM Phase 1 is concluded, there shouldn’t be any problems transferring 2600s to Skokie from both yards. I predict that the 3200s can provide service until around 2028-2030 depending on how precise and efficient of the other 7000s options being exercised.

[artthouwill]

9 hours ago, garmon757 said:

 

The first 400 cars are slated to be strictly assigned to the Blue Line. There’s a possibility that the remaining 3200s from the Blue can return back to Brown and Orange Lines to fill the yard capacities respectively while the process of scrapping 2600s can begin without being short on trains at Kimball and Midway yards. By the time RPM Phase 1 is concluded, there shouldn’t be any problems transferring 2600s to Skokie from both yards. I predict that the 3200s can provide service until around 2028-2030 depending on how precise and efficient of the other 7000s options being exercised.

This makes sense .  We'll see how and when CTA will exercise the options. 

[Busjack]

10 hours ago, garmon757 said:

 

The first 400 cars are slated to be strictly assigned to the Blue Line. There’s a possibility that the remaining 3200s from the Blue can return back to Brown and Orange Lines to fill the yard capacities respectively while the process of scrapping 2600s can begin without being short on trains at Kimball and Midway yards. By the time RPM Phase 1 is concluded, there shouldn’t be any problems transferring 2600s to Skokie from both yards. I predict that the 3200s can provide service until around 2028-2030 depending on how precise and efficient of the other 7000s options being exercised.

That still leaves unanswered how many cars it now takes to run the Blue Line. If it's 400, and not 320, the Brown and Orange Lines would be stuck with maybe 360 direct current cars, which means that the first "expansion" option would have to be exercised to take care of the Orange and Brown lines. Any actual expansion would be limited to the last option of 90.

 

Of course, the 714 5000s replaced something like 450-500 cars by this math. chicago-l. org show 1458 cars on the roster in 2018 (not counting LTHs), compared to 1190 way back when.

 

[Bus1883]

6 hours ago, Busjack said:

That still leaves unanswered how many cars it now takes to run the Blue Line. If it's 400, and not 320, the Brown and Orange Lines would be stuck with maybe 360 direct current cars, which means that the first "expansion" option would have to be exercised to take care of the Orange and Brown lines. Any actual expansion would be limited to the last option of 90.

 

Of course, the 714 5000s replaced something like 450-500 cars by this math. chicago-l. org show 1458 cars on the roster in 2018 (not counting LTHs), compared to 1190 way back when.

 

My question is could the trackage respond to how heavy the #7000’s weigh compared to the #5000’s if they crank more cars on the Blue? Well I’m guessing that there is nothing wrong now. The #2600’s on Blue Line are beat up and which Blue Line will be first to shitcan their 258 #2600’s to Skokie in preparation of the scrapper. 

[garmon757]

9 hours ago, Busjack said:

That still leaves unanswered how many cars it now takes to run the Blue Line. If it's 400, and not 320, the Brown and Orange Lines would be stuck with maybe 360 direct current cars, which means that the first "expansion" option would have to be exercised to take care of the Orange and Brown lines. Any actual expansion would be limited to the last option of 90.

 

Of course, the 714 5000s replaced something like 450-500 cars by this math. chicago-l. org show 1458 cars on the roster in 2018 (not counting LTHs), compared to 1190 way back when.

 

Well, the yard capacities for both Kimball and Midway is approximately 400 cars combined, in which it’s nearly equal with both yards Forest Park and Rosemont holds approximately 390 cars combined. By the way, the L roster on the Chicago L website has dramatically changed and needs to be updated. 

[Busjack]

14 hours ago, garmon757 said:

Well, the yard capacities for both Kimball and Midway is approximately 400 cars combined, in which it’s nearly equal with both yards Forest Park and Rosemont holds approximately 390 cars combined. By the way, the L roster on the Chicago L website has dramatically changed and needs to be updated. 

Regardless of the chicago-l.org assignment list not having been updated in 3 years, it establishes that you and @Bus1883 are on the right track. It looks like it will take something like 750 cars to run an all AC fleet. That's going to take 6 yrs, 3 months (at 10/month). or late 2028. That would make the 3200s 36 years old, which would justify all the money spent rehabbing them.

The last option coming on line in 2029 would be in line with RLE.

Still hard to conceive that CTA is now running ~1500 cars.

[BusHunter]

Was reading about the problems with the crrc cars in Boston. They are having a host of issues over there. It's so bad the rush hour schedule is running at a weekend capacity due to lack of trains. Was laughing at one article, (I guess they are running on the orange line) the article writer said they should change the name of the orange line to lemon. 

Hopefully cta is paying attention here and crrc has improved since that order. Running production cars in non revenue service makes me wonder. I don't think that's ever happened before. Time will tell however. 

[artthouwill]

1 hour ago, BusHunter said:

Was reading about the problems with the crrc cars in Boston. They are having a host of issues over there. It's so bad the rush hour schedule is running at a weekend capacity due to lack of trains. Was laughing at one article, (I guess they are running on the orange line) the article writer said they should change the name of the orange line to lemon. 

Hopefully cta is paying attention here and crrc has improved since that order. Running production cars in non revenue service makes me wonder. I don't think that's ever happened before. Time will tell however. 

I think the Boston cars are at least 3 years old.   Hopefully whatever kinks CRRC had in Boston have been worked out here.   At least the 7000s are being assembled here in Chicago,  so CTA can have more QC oversight.   

I have noticed the extreme slow rolling out of these new cars.  Perhaps this is out of an abundance of caution.   I wonder when CTA will get these cars in revenue service. 

[BusHunter]

3 hours ago, artthouwill said:

I think the Boston cars are at least 3 years old.   Hopefully whatever kinks CRRC had in Boston have been worked out here.   At least the 7000s are being assembled here in Chicago,  so CTA can have more QC oversight.   

I have noticed the extreme slow rolling out of these new cars.  Perhaps this is out of an abundance of caution.   I wonder when CTA will get these cars in revenue service. 

They should be getting 10 more this month. I don't think the #7013's have ran in revenue service yet AFAIK. Boston was saying the cars over there caused a derailment. There have been frame issues, cars not kneeling. I was like wow!! We already had our first blunder in #7011 hopefully it's not the start of something bad. 

[artthouwill]

31 minutes ago, BusHunter said:

They should be getting 10 more this month. I don't think the #7013's have ran in revenue service yet AFAIK. Boston was saying the cars over there caused a derailment. There have been frame issues, cars not kneeling. I was like wow!! We already had our first blunder in #7011 hopefully it's not the start of something bad. 

I think 7011 was damaged en route from Hegewisch to Skokie Shops.  Hence it wasn't CRRC 'S fault abd it wasn't CTA'S fault.   But since the shells are built in China,  back to China that car goes  

My wonder is what happens when the 7000s enter service?  Will they send 3200s to the Brown line and retire the Brown line 2600s first,  or will they just start removing 2600s from the Blue Line until they are done,  then start sending 3200s to the Brown line and then finally the Orange Line?  Or will they do a combination of all of the above?

 

[BusHunter]

4 hours ago, artthouwill said:

I think 7011 was damaged en route from Hegewisch to Skokie Shops.  Hence it wasn't CRRC 'S fault abd it wasn't CTA'S fault.   But since the shells are built in China,  back to China that car goes  

My wonder is what happens when the 7000s enter service?  Will they send 3200s to the Brown line and retire the Brown line 2600s first,  or will they just start removing 2600s from the Blue Line until they are done,  then start sending 3200s to the Brown line and then finally the Orange Line?  Or will they do a combination of all of the above?

 

Whoever has the worst equipment would be my guess. Orange line tends to have the best equipment, followed by the Brown and blue. But each line has good cars and bad cars. So it will be a consolidation of good cars that make it. 2600s will go first. Blue will send #3200's to Orange and Brown eventually and those will retire what's left of their #2600's. So I would think the counts of #2600's would dwindle at each yard, but most likely maintain even counts with each other. I would then start running 2600s in the rush only and maybe they could save on maintenance. 

Based on the counts on the roster 268 #2600's at blue, 168 on the orange and 58 on the brown. I would think 100 cars would need to leave blue first. 

[artthouwill]

15 hours ago, BusHunter said:

Whoever has the worst equipment would be my guess. Orange line tends to have the best equipment, followed by the Brown and blue. But each line has good cars and bad cars. So it will be a consolidation of good cars that make it. 2600s will go first. Blue will send #3200's to Orange and Brown eventually and those will retire what's left of their #2600's. So I would think the counts of #2600's would dwindle at each yard, but most likely maintain even counts with each other. I would then start running 2600s in the rush only and maybe they could save on maintenance. 

Based on the counts on the roster 268 #2600's at blue, 168 on the orange and 58 on the brown. I would think 100 cars would need to leave blue first. 

If your roster count is correct, that's 494 2600 series cars.   But I think Orange has to have more than 58 cars.  Also  isn't the Kimball Yard limited to 144 cars?  It seems like 24 of those you have assigned to Brown should be assigned to Orange,  which would give the Orange Line closer to  the correct amount of cars 

We probably need to see about 50 or 60 if the new cars in revenue service before we see any moves regarding retirements or movement of any 3200s. 

 

[Javi75]

Anybody think CRRC is going to switch up the interior color on later 7000s like when the rest of the 5000s were blue interior cars. 

[chicago transut authority]

28 minutes ago, Javi75 said:

Anybody think CRRC is going to switch up the interior color on later 7000s like when the rest of the 5000s were blue interior cars. 

light green interior.

[chicago transut authority]

the 7000-series railcar will also be assigned to the purple line during rush hour from brown line.