9000-series

[Sam92]

On 11/17/2023 at 7:53 PM, Busjack said:

The answer to your last question is probably not. Assuming 218 or so cars at 54th yard and the Green Line, that's 496 cars on R, Y, P. RLE would require another 84 cars. I think moving 5000s from Pink and Green is more likely.

 

On 11/17/2023 at 7:39 PM, Javi75 said:

I could see CTA fully equipping the blue line with 7000s then when the 9000s come, send the 7000s to brown, orange and possibly pink. Fully equip the green line with the rest of the 9000s sending its 5000s to the red line. Red, purple and yellow would have all 5000s. In another scenario factoring RLE would 546 9000s be enough for red, purple and yellow? 

Well if the expansion of services happen then Red, purple and yellow would need 662 cars combined. If they want to keep just one series at Howard then that leaves 5000s as the only choice. 9000s can go to Blue and Brown. 7000s can go to Orange, Green and Pink. Seeing as purple line uses the same set of 5400s it would make sense to at least assign 7000s to the Red line to give it newer cars. Then send 150 5000s to green and another 150 to orange. The rest can go to Pink

[artthouwill]

49 minutes ago, Sam92 said:

 

Well if the expansion of services happen then Red, purple and yellow would need 662 cars combined. If they want to keep just one series at Howard then that leaves 5000s as the only choice. 9000s can go to Blue and Brown. 7000s can go to Orange, Green and Pink. Seeing as purple line uses the same set of 5400s it would make sense to at least assign 7000s to the Red line to give it newer cars. Then send 150 5000s to green and another 150 to orange. The rest can go to Pink

I think what @Busjack said makes the most sense..  it's also the easiest.   Just pull the Pink and Green Line 5000s and put them on Red, which covers the Red Line expansion.  The new 9000 cars can go to Green, Pink, Orange,  and Brown. 

[Javi75]

On 12/2/2023 at 3:06 PM, artthouwill said:

I think what @Busjack said makes the most sense..  it's also the easiest.   Just pull the Pink and Green Line 5000s and put them on Red, which covers the Red Line expansion.  The new 9000 cars can go to Green, Pink, Orange,  and Brown. 

The loop elevated fleet very uniformed outside of peak rush when purple heads to the loop. Hopefully they do blue ends on this series, I like that about the 7000s. It’s a different look for CTA rail cars. 

[Busjack]

8 hours ago, Javi75 said:

The loop elevated fleet very uniformed outside of peak rush when purple heads to the loop.

Nope. The Green and Pink Lines also run there. Maybe you mean after my proposal.

[Javi75]

24 minutes ago, Busjack said:

Nope. The Green and Pink Lines also run there. Maybe you mean after my proposal.

I was talking about if the 9000s go to green orange, pink and brown that would make the loop elevated a uniform fleet outside of when the purple line express runs. How long do you think it will be before the 9000s see revenue service? I could see the 2600s reaching 50 year service lives with the 3200s hitting their 40s. 

[Busjack]

1 minute ago, Javi75 said:

How long do you think it will be before the 9000s see revenue service? I could see the 2600s reaching 50 year service lives with the 3200s hitting their 40s. 

I indicated before that if past is prologue, it will take a year to design them and solicit bids, then some time for the winning bidder to build prototypes, and then a year of testing. Considering that I pushed it out to at least 2027, I wonder how far behind CRRC is on the 7000s.

[Javi75]

2 hours ago, Busjack said:

I indicated before that if past is prologue, it will take a year to design them and solicit bids, then some time for the winning bidder to build prototypes, and then a year of testing. Considering that I pushed it out to at least 2027, I wonder how far behind CRRC is on the 7000s.

I wish CTA would’ve landed a deal with the 5000s the way it did with the new flyer 1000s. Had another contract option of 350 more 5000s cars, that’s a really good series despite early issues. 

[Javi75]

I’m guessing CCRC won’t be manufacturing the 9000s though and we find a quality manufacturer that can get the series in service efficiently. I brought up the 5000s and 7000s just to hope that there isn’t another set back with future rail cars. I wonder who does the design proposals for railcars. 

[Javi75]

6 hours ago, Busjack said:

I indicated before that if past is prologue, it will take a year to design them and solicit bids, then some time for the winning bidder to build prototypes, and then a year of testing. Considering that I pushed it out to at least 2027, I wonder how far behind CRRC is on the 7000s.

Also how much power does the mayor of Chicago have in railcar orders? I wouldn’t want Brandon Johnson touching anything related to CTA lol, he’s the type who would complicate a railcar order. 

[Busjack]

3 hours ago, Javi75 said:

Also how much power does the mayor of Chicago have in railcar orders? I wouldn’t want Brandon Johnson touching anything related to CTA lol, he’s the type who would complicate a railcar order. 

Rahm Emanuel thought he had some, when he said (1) Bombardier was going to rebuild 3200s in Chicago, and (2) the 7000s contract would bring jobs to Chicago. He got rebuked both times.

In short, the answer is none. Do you think a teacher is a rail engineer? The response to the protest on the 7000s said what the mayor says is of no effect; there are procurement regulations.

[Javi75]

2 hours ago, Busjack said:

Rahm Emanuel thought he had some, when he said (1) Bombardier was going to rebuild 3200s in Chicago, and (2) the 7000s contract would bring jobs to Chicago. He got rebuked both times.

In short, the answer is none. Do you think a teacher is a rail engineer? The response to the protest on the 7000s said what the mayor says is of no effect; there are procurement regulations.

That’s good to know lol, it’s best to keep political power away from ta equipment decision. 

[Busjack]

Agenda for Feb. 14 has:

• It appears to be a typo, as presumably 9000s (unless its something else, but CTA said the grant included  designing the next generation of cars).
• One wonders how far out of date the 7000s spec is, if CTA needs a consultant to update the engineering.
• We'll have to see Wednesday if there actually is any discussion of this.

[strictures]

I'm baffled as to why the CTA is designing the next series of cars, when the current series order is nowhere near complete. Exactly what new can they do, that the 7000s don't do?

[Busjack]

11 minutes ago, strictures said:

I'm baffled as to why the CTA is designing the next series of cars, when the current series order is nowhere near complete. Exactly what new can they do, that the 7000s don't do?

I don't either, when the 7000s spec was open-ended, with such things as "doors can slide inside or outside the car walls" and "if Van Dorn couplers are used, an adapter to couple with Form 5 couplers must be provided." (Neither happened.) The only thing firm was to use the 3200 seating arrangement. The only thing that was clear is by the time the 5000 spec. was re-released for the up to 846 cars, it was unworkable (except for Bombardier as a sole source), and obsolete (such as the punch-board system map). So, whatever is satisfactory for the rest of the 400 CRRC cars is apparently not for the 9000s.

[strictures]

3 hours ago, Busjack said:

I don't either, when the 7000s spec was open-ended, with such things as "doors can slide inside or outside the car walls" and "if Van Dorn couplers are used, an adapter to couple with Form 5 couplers must be provided."

Was anyone even considering an obsolete coupler design like the Van Dorn?

[Busjack]

8 minutes ago, strictures said:

Was anyone even considering an obsolete coupler design like the Van Dorn?

It wasn't disclosed who other than Bombardier or CRRC bid or what anyone proposed.

 

[Busjack]

On 2/12/2024 at 11:50 AM, Busjack said:

We'll have to see Wednesday if there actually is any discussion of this.

"No questions." "No questions."

[wayfaringrob]

Seems like it's not a typo, but additional funding

https://rtams.org/media/resources/cta-contracts-2016

[Busjack]

13 hours ago, dailycommuter62 said:

A cta planning document popped up eBay has some interesting discussion regarding future specs for railcars (specifically the 3200s I think?). Talk about purchasing new singles for the yellow line and usage of flip-dot signs on the cars.

Do you have a link, or just a rumor? Based on the above, it's probably for 9000s (see above), but nothing is yet on the contract opportunities portal.

There was an ordinance passed in April 2024 for propulsion kits for 3200s.

In light of @artthouwill's comment below, and seeing the link in the quote above, I retract this comment.

[artthouwill]

35 minutes ago, Busjack said:

Do you have a link, or just a rumor? Based on the above, it's probably for 9000s (see above), but nothing is yet on the contract opportunities portal.

There was an ordinance passed in April 2024 for propulsion kits for 3200s.

It looked like the document was from 1984, hence a possibility that it could have been referring to what became the 3209 series cars.  We know now that the series came in married pairs, unlike the cars on the Skokie Swift at the time that were single cars.  At first glance. I thought the same thing you did,  but when I saw the year, then his post made sense.

[Kevin]

Mentions of the 9000-series have been mostly scrubbed from the 2025 budget, which instead now confusingly refers to both a 846 car 7000-series and a “future” 7400-series. But the section on that 7400-series still says “Series-9000” in the description. 

 

[artthouwill]

2 hours ago, Kevin said:

Mentions of the 9000-series have been mostly scrubbed from the 2025 budget, which instead now confusingly refers to both a 846 car 7000-series and a “future” 7400-series. But the section on that 7400-series still says “Series-9000” in the description. 

 

Maybe this means that CTA has decided to renumbered the 9000 series as the 7400 series.  O don't see CTA exercising any options with CRRC.   This doesn't appear to be any different from the Boeing 2400 series and the Budd 2600 series and the MK 3200 series other than compatability.  Perhaps CTA is saying the 9000s for a future bus number series.

[Busjack]

5 hours ago, artthouwill said:

O don't see CTA exercising any options with CRRC. 

Unless this is poor editing (which is always a factor with CTA), the first clip said:

 

On the other hand, the 9000 series was announced in May, 2023 and nothing (like specifications) has happened since, and, at that rate (considering the procurement process and one year trial of prototypes)  no way they could enter production in 2027. If the remaining ~250 cars are currently in production, and this is not a lie (which is also possible), CTA must have worked out the issues with CRRC. Maybe Alstom and Kawasaki said they couldn't do it in time for RLE.

[artthouwill]

2 hours ago, Busjack said:

Unless this is poor editing (which is always a factor with CTA), the first clip said:

 

On the other hand, the 9000 series was announced in May, 2023 and nothing (like specifications) has happened since, and, at that rate (considering the procurement process and one year trial of prototypes)  no way they could enter production in 2027. If the remaining ~250 cars are currently in production, and this is not a lie (which is also possible), CTA must have worked out the issues with CRRC. Maybe Alstom and Kawasaki said they couldn't do it in time for RLE.

At the current production rate, 2027 seems to be perfect for starting production of Option cars built by CRRC.   Depending on the delivery schedule,  one of the lines equipped with 5000s may get 7400s with the 5000s shifting to the Red for RLE.  (Here's looking at the Green Line).