Name your favorite express routes!

[Mr.NewFlyer1051]

1 hour ago, Erin Mishkin Jr. said:

never saw any 79th termianls so far each time i rode the 3

they don’t say it on the sign driver will usually tell you i had a couple last week go to 79th and on friday evening around 5:30pm

[artthouwill]

1 hour ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Probably not wise to do that while CSU is in session. Besides, that didn't play all that well when the 4 was ending at 94th for a while, there was a stink about that for a minute and that was one block away. Moreover, with the big square loop buses would have to take going out of service at 79th and returning, a regular bus would've made it to 91st, if not 93rd, and by then the time saved is negligible, especially if the driver still has to break. If anything, not every 3 trip needs to go down the Mag Mile (or even to Michigan/Chicago, cut where the 2/157 do)

The return of the 4 to 94th was because Chicago State temporarily closed the CSU loop for reconstruction. 

The 3 has a high enough frequency that every bys doesn't have to go to 95tg.  In fact, buses that end at 95th can terminate northbound at Michigan/Randolph and buses that begin at 79th can run to Fairbanks and Ontario. That should cut down bunching and add more consistency. 

@Erin Mishkin Jr., there was no "termunal" at 79th and King Drive.   Buses would go to 80th, Calumet, 81st, then turn NB on King Drive and stage midblock before continuing north.  However,  these bus also short turned NB  at 30th (originally (, then that switched to Michael Reese Hospital before it closed.    The only real benefit was to accommodate Dunbar students.

[YoungBusLover]

1 hour ago, Erin Mishkin Jr. said:

never saw any 79th termianls so far each time i rode the 3

Normally what happens is operators without a relief are told to only go to 79th and pull in via 79th or short turn at 81st and have a fallback there. Now there is a few school runs that only go to 79th from Dunbar but outside of that it rare for any buses to short turn at 81st unless they're 20-30 minutes behind schedule. 

2 hours ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Probably not wise to do that while CSU is in session. Besides, that didn't play all that well when the 4 was ending at 94th for a while, there was a stink about that for a minute and that was one block away. Moreover, with the big square loop buses would have to take going out of service at 79th and returning, a regular bus would've made it to 91st, if not 93rd, and by then the time saved is negligible, especially if the driver still has to break. If anything, not every 3 trip needs to go down the Mag Mile (or even to Michigan/Chicago, cut where the 2/157 do)

I honestly think students wouldn't be effected by it that much, I hardly see any actually during my trips around the rush periods. They're mainly getting rideshare services, parents picking or dropping off or taking the 95 and 115 via the red line to the campus. I've only had two students who then later changed there route to the 95 after realizing how long it would take to get to 31st and King Drive via the 3. With such limited space in the gold coast for a practical bus termianl I don't know where to actually reroute the 3 to. The entire northwestern terminal us already congested enough which can hold up to 6 buses at a time when done correctly. It's just hard to place extra buses on an express route over there without any unnecessary bottlenecks.

[NewFlyerMCI]

18 minutes ago, YoungBusLover said:

Normally what happens is operators without a relief are told to only go to 79th and pull in via 79th or short turn at 81st and have a fallback there. Now there is a few school runs that only go to 79th from Dunbar but outside of that it rare for any buses to short turn at 81st unless they're 20-30 minutes behind schedule. 

Didn't know the 81st buses turned using Calumet, I know CTA likes sticking to the big streets when they can (ex. OOS 79 buses using 76th as their personal speedway lol)

 

42 minutes ago, artthouwill said:

The 3 has a high enough frequency that every bys doesn't have to go to 95tg.  In fact, buses that end at 95th can terminate northbound at Michigan/Randolph and buses that begin at 79th can run to Fairbanks and Ontario. That should cut down bunching and add more consistency. 

 

21 minutes ago, YoungBusLover said:

I honestly think students wouldn't be effected by it that much, I hardly see any actually during my trips around the rush periods. They're mainly getting rideshare services, parents picking or dropping off or taking the 95 and 115 via the red line to the campus. I've only had two students who then later changed there route to the 95 after realizing how long it would take to get to 31st and King Drive via the 3.

Fair enough. I'm still of the opinion that the change in distance is too short to actually change anything. I've had the right bus drivers cover 76th to 95th in under 10 mins, and it's never taken more than ~17. Moreover, we on this sub might know why this "could" be beneficial, but CTA would never be able to explain it in a way that would go over well with the residents along that section of King Drive. I'd actually be in favor of a partial version of @artthouwill's solution for the NB terminals.

[YoungBusLover]

29 minutes ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Didn't know the 81st buses turned using Calumet, I know CTA likes sticking to the big streets when they can (ex. OOS 79 buses using 76th as their personal speedway lol)

 

 

Fair enough. I'm still of the opinion that the change in distance is too short to actually change anything. I've had the right bus drivers cover 76th to 95th in under 10 mins, and it's never taken more than ~17. Moreover, we on this sub might know why this "could" be beneficial, but CTA would never be able to explain it in a way that would go over well with the residents along that section of King Drive. I'd actually be in favor of a partial version of @artthouwill's solution for the NB terminals.

Yeah since Calument is a wide one way street CTA deemed it accessible for buses to use. 76th is quicker than 79th in some aspects that for dang sure ??. As far as @artthouwill point goes I like the idea on the paper but in reality you'd have a bigger bottleneck at Randolph and Columbus especially with #4000s constantly being placed on the 4. Three artics take up the entire layover space where as 5 #10/#7900s normally take up the space. Those short trips going NB should serve some type of attraction of value south of Wacker Dr. Perhaps the Art Institute or maybe Millennium Park via Columbus Dr. Having those short trips terminate at Monroe and Columbus and begin at Washington and Michigan via the Randolph viaduct.

[NewFlyerMCI]

16 minutes ago, YoungBusLover said:

Yeah since Calument is a wide one way street CTA deemed it accessible for buses to use. 76th is quicker than 79th in some aspects that for dang sure ??. As far as @artthouwill point goes I like the idea on the paper but in reality you'd have a bigger bottleneck at Randolph and Columbus especially with #4000s constantly being placed on the 4. Three artics take up the entire layover space where as 5 #10/#7900s normally take up the space. Those short trips going NB should serve some type of attraction of value south of Wacker Dr. Perhaps the Art Institute or maybe Millennium Park via Columbus Dr. Having those short trips terminate at Monroe and Columbus and begin at Washington and Michigan via the Randolph viaduct.

3 could've laid up where the 20 did before the 6 moved there full time. Surprised that sign hasn't changed to Illinois Center yet.

[ChicagoNova]

11 hours ago, Sam92 said:

No place to layover with evergreen gone. Same reason 95 and 48 are at Damen 

Or at least Western/87th.

[YoungBusLover]

34 minutes ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

3 could've laid up where the 20 did before the 6 moved there full time. Surprised that sign hasn't changed to Illinois Center yet.

Yeah the only other place I can think of is the 60 layover terminal further east.Not to change topics though but why doesn't the 60 go to Navy Pier?  The ridership is there to support the extension and it would also help with those 20 minute intervals that the 124 has during throughout the course of the day. The 60 and 124 would be going in the same direction anyway via the loop link.

[NewFlyerMCI]

1 hour ago, ChicagoNova said:

Or at least Western/87th.

Only buses heading WB on 87th can make that turn, as is, anything else requires road configuration. This also defeats the purpose of extending the X49 further south

[NewFlyerMCI]

1 hour ago, YoungBusLover said:

Yeah the only other place I can think of is the 60 layover terminal further east.Not to change topics though but why doesn't the 60 go to Navy Pier?  The ridership is there to support the extension and it would also help with those 20 minute intervals that the 124 has during throughout the course of the day. The 60 and 124 would be going in the same direction anyway via the loop link.

I've been curious about this too. The 60 has been terminating at Harbor Condominiums since late 1979 (the building was constructed 1975, can't tell if that was the start or finish date). I've always assumed it was due to Harbor Condos paying for the bus to end there and/or terminal constraints at Navy Pier (I don't think there's ever been more than 4 routes there at a time)

[artthouwill]

2 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

Yeah the only other place I can think of is the 60 layover terminal further east.Not to change topics though but why doesn't the 60 go to Navy Pier?  The ridership is there to support the extension and it would also help with those 20 minute intervals that the 124 has during throughout the course of the day. The 60 and 124 would be going in the same direction anyway via the loop link.

The only reason would be duplication.  Otherwise the 56 would still be going there.  Remember the 124 replaced the 56 when the 124 (which originated as an express route) became a local route. 

[Sam92]

1 hour ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

I've been curious about this too. The 60 has been terminating at Harbor Condominiums since late 1979 (the building was constructed 1975, can't tell if that was the start or finish date). I've always assumed it was due to Harbor Condos paying for the bus to end there and/or terminal constraints at Navy Pier (I don't think there's ever been more than 4 routes there at a time)

 

1 hour ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

I've been curious about this too. The 60 has been terminating at Harbor Condominiums since late 1979 (the building was constructed 1975, can't tell if that was the start or finish date). I've always assumed it was due to Harbor Condos paying for the bus to end there and/or terminal constraints at Navy Pier (I don't think there's ever been more than 4 routes there at a time)

 

2 hours ago, YoungBusLover said:

Yeah the only other place I can think of is the 60 layover terminal further east.Not to change topics though but why doesn't the 60 go to Navy Pier?  The ridership is there to support the extension and it would also help with those 20 minute intervals that the 124 has during throughout the course of the day. The 60 and 124 would be going in the same direction anyway via the loop link.

On top of what art said getting out of Navy Pier is a milk run so last thing you’d Wanna do is link it to a bus that’s already carrying a fair amount of people. 29 works cause the street flows good and the red line picks out majority of the work letting the state bus be a shuttle. 56 already has a hard time dealing with milwaukee itself. To be honest Navy Pier would probably do better just having anything  serving it be an exclusive downtown shuttle type route. Take 29 and 65 out and have a bus from McCormick/Muesum campus take over from the south loop to Navy Pier via 146 routing but heading to navy pier at Chicago, a bus that expresses down grand to the Blue Line and we already have 124 for the west loop. 29, 65 and 66 and end at the water tower or where the 26 lays over. 146 can end on Roosevelt by Canal since it isn’t as volitile as heading into the campus 

[NewFlyerMCI]

9 hours ago, Sam92 said:

 

 

On top of what art said getting out of Navy Pier is a milk run so last thing you’d Wanna do is link it to a bus that’s already carrying a fair amount of people. 29 works cause the street flows good and the red line picks out majority of the work letting the state bus be a shuttle. 56 already has a hard time dealing with milwaukee itself. To be honest Navy Pier would probably do better just having anything  serving it be an exclusive downtown shuttle type route. Take 29 and 65 out and have a bus from McCormick/Muesum campus take over from the south loop to Navy Pier via 146 routing but heading to navy pier at Chicago, a bus that expresses down grand to the Blue Line and we already have 124 for the west loop. 29, 65 and 66 and end at the water tower or where the 26 lays over. 146 can end on Roosevelt by Canal since it isn’t as volitile as heading into the campus 

I've said before the 124 & 130 should merge. You get a nice little downtown circulator/1 route from Ogl/Un that serves all the major attractions

There's nowhere around water tower where three separate routes can layover (at least in the same space) without CTA getting permits for the whole block. One route might be able to do Chestnut/Mies, but not during rush hour (well, pre-pandemic rush hour at least) since there would be no space with the 125.

The 26 lays over downtown? I thought buses returned OOS, except for the few morning trips that overlap and start the afternoon trips

[Sam92]

22 minutes ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

I've said before the 124 & 130 should merge. You get a nice little downtown circulator/1 route from Ogl/Un that serves all the major attractions

There's nowhere around water tower where three separate routes can layover (at least in the same space) without CTA getting permits for the whole block. One route might be able to do Chestnut/Mies, but not during rush hour (well, pre-pandemic rush hour at least) since there would be no space with the 125.

The 26 lays over downtown? I thought buses returned OOS, except for the few morning trips that overlap and start the afternoon trips

They layover after deadheading back north. You could probably have a few buses stage around that area

[ChicagoNova]

As far as the Purple Line Express is concerned, I wish CTA would have it go downtown during all hours of service instead of just during rush hour.

[Sam92]

2 hours ago, ChicagoNova said:

As far as the Purple Line Express is concerned, I wish CTA would have it go downtown during all hours of service instead of just during rush hour.

It may not be tomorrow but so many signs point to this becoming a reality at some point. Cta themselves said it’s about time to pull a train from the Loop “L” and put it in a subway. Using purple would reduce excess trains on the Dan Ryan. It’s just a matter of where to turn them around. I’d even suggest axing the Ashland green line branch and connecting purple with the cottage grove branch of the green line letting lake be its own branch..

[NewFlyerMCI]

7 hours ago, Sam92 said:

It may not be tomorrow but so many signs point to this becoming a reality at some point. Cta themselves said it’s about time to pull a train from the Loop “L” and put it in a subway. Using purple would reduce excess trains on the Dan Ryan. It’s just a matter of where to turn them around. I’d even suggest axing the Ashland green line branch and connecting purple with the cottage grove branch of the green line letting lake be its own branch..

Turning the West 63rd branch into a shuttle train will not go over well lol. If anything, just cut back the Green Line trains that would've gone to Cottage at the loop and send the other ones down

[NovaHater]

On 12/13/2021 at 10:12 AM, Mr.NewFlyer1051 said:

it would be good bringing back express routes even if it’s just for rush hours only because ima 3 daily user and trust me you hop on a packed bus? your not gonna get any farther then next to the driver that’s how packed it gets even if there’s a follower behind it all are packed (southbound PM)and on top of that they stop at every single stop that’s also another reason how bus bunching starts also traffic @YoungBusLoverused to drive the 3 he knows how it’s like 

I operate the 3 during the pm rush week days and occasionally during the am rush on trippers. In my opinion, there is definitely a need for the x3. The problem is dwell time at the service stops. With a high concentration of seniors boarding mixed with a high concentration of students you spend more time sitting than moving. I'd run it from Michigan and Chicago skipping every other stop and stopping only at major intersections until you reach 79th. I also believe there is a need for a x79. I know some won't be fans if this idea but most of the heavy load is between South Shore and the Redline. So I would run it only stopping at South Shore, Yates, Jeffrey, Stony Island, Woods, Cottage, King Drive, and the Redline. Even with 3-5 minute headways you still end up leaving standing loads at service stops because there is no room. I just experience this Monday and Tuesday during the am rush. 

[NewFlyerMCI]

6 minutes ago, NovaHater said:

I operate the 3 during the pm rush week days and occasionally during the am rush on trippers. In my opinion, there is definitely a need for the x3. The problem is dwell time at the service stops. With a high concentration of seniors boarding mixed with a high concentration of students you spend more time sitting than moving. I'd run it from Michigan and Chicago skipping every other stop and stopping only at major intersections until you reach 79th. I also believe there is a need for a x79. I know some won't be fans if this idea but most of the heavy load is between South Shore and the Redline. So I would run it only stopping at South Shore, Yates, Jeffrey, Stony Island, Woods, Cottage, King Drive, and the Redline. Even with 3-5 minute headways you still end up leaving standing loads at service stops because there is no room. I just experience this Monday and Tuesday during the am rush. 

I think the issue with the an X79 is the busiest section of the route is also where buses can't really pass each other. All the X routes are on wide enough streets to allow that (with King Drive really being the only narrow one south of 51st that I can think of). East 79th isn't really set up like that, and because there are so many buses along that corridor, there's no guarantee that because a local has pulled up to a stop, there will be space for an X79 to pass. I'm otherwise in favor of such a route.

[Sam92]

39 minutes ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

Turning the West 63rd branch into a shuttle train will not go over well lol. If anything, just cut back the Green Line trains that would've gone to Cottage at the loop and send the other ones down

I said ax as in cut the Ashland branch and the lake branch was basically gonna be it’s own line. Or turn every other train around in the loop and coordinate the remaining ones between purples to cottage. 

[NovaHater]

49 minutes ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

I think the issue with the an X79 is the busiest section of the route is also where buses can't really pass each other. All the X routes are on wide enough streets to allow that (with King Drive really being the only narrow one south of 51st that I can think of). East 79th isn't really set up like that, and because there are so many buses along that corridor, there's no guarantee that because a local has pulled up to a stop, there will be space for an X79 to pass. I'm otherwise in favor of such a route.

Believe it or not, we constantly pass each other between that section. The only tight area is between Cottage and Indiana. And if the bus is curbed correctly that isn't a problem. I do it every day even with a 4000

[Mr.NewFlyer1051]

1 hour ago, NovaHater said:

I operate the 3 during the pm rush week days and occasionally during the am rush on trippers. In my opinion, there is definitely a need for the x3. The problem is dwell time at the service stops. With a high concentration of seniors boarding mixed with a high concentration of students you spend more time sitting than moving. I'd run it from Michigan and Chicago skipping every other stop and stopping only at major intersections until you reach 79th. I also believe there is a need for a x79. I know some won't be fans if this idea but most of the heavy load is between South Shore and the Redline. So I would run it only stopping at South Shore, Yates, Jeffrey, Stony Island, Woods, Cottage, King Drive, and the Redline. Even with 3-5 minute headways you still end up leaving standing loads at service stops because there is no room. I just experience this Monday and Tuesday during the am rush. 

i’m on the 3 weekdays only lmao that’s how i know from my experience a X3 is definitely needed you were probably my driver one of those trips?? i rode the 79th bus the other day from south shore to the red line on a 60footer it got packed by the time we reached stony island and definitely a X79 wouldn’t be a bad idea 

[ChicagoNova]

9 hours ago, Sam92 said:

I’d even suggest axing the Ashland green line branch and connecting purple with the cottage grove branch of the green line letting lake be its own branch..

I've been thinking that too for quite a while.

[NewFlyerMCI]

22 minutes ago, NovaHater said:

Believe it or not, we constantly pass each other between that section. The only tight area is between Cottage and Indiana. And if the bus is curbed correctly that isn't a problem. I do it every day even with a 4000

I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but for every instance you have of passing a bus, I probably have one where it didn't happen and we have a procession of buses bunching down east 79th. Also, East 79th is ~45 ft wide, 1 travel lane (~13 ft), 1 parking lane (~8 ft), each direction, all the way to South Shore, with minor exceptions at certain intersections, Cottage to Indiana is not the only tight section

[YoungBusLover]

3 hours ago, NovaHater said:

I operate the 3 during the pm rush week days and occasionally during the am rush on trippers. In my opinion, there is definitely a need for the x3. The problem is dwell time at the service stops. With a high concentration of seniors boarding mixed with a high concentration of students you spend more time sitting than moving. I'd run it from Michigan and Chicago skipping every other stop and stopping only at major intersections until you reach 79th. I also believe there is a need for a x79. I know some won't be fans if this idea but most of the heavy load is between South Shore and the Redline. So I would run it only stopping at South Shore, Yates, Jeffrey, Stony Island, Woods, Cottage, King Drive, and the Redline. Even with 3-5 minute headways you still end up leaving standing loads at service stops because there is no room. I just experience this Monday and Tuesday during the am rush. 

Now if were thinking of adding the X3 back pre pandemic you have a good argument for it but to me depending on the day of the week you'll have numerous operators play games out there and hardly pick up anyone riding the street 5-10 early behind there leader that is getting killed. Hell some will even sit behind there leader even if there leader is waving them by to pass. I've experienced it as a part timer and full timer, I leave Northwestern on time on 6-7 min headway and magically here come two more buses behind me as soon as I get across Wacker and they'll normally ride behind me until Cermak and fly by me then find a stop further SB to sit at since they're early while I'm doing all the work. King Drive has such a high density of people with so many operators not understanding how to work the street properly. I've had standing loads and hardly ever got more 4-5 mins behind and usually by the time I got to Cermak going NB i'm on time and vice versa going SB once I got past 51st. 

3 hours ago, NewFlyerMCI said:

I think the issue with the an X79 is the busiest section of the route is also where buses can't really pass each other. All the X routes are on wide enough streets to allow that (with King Drive really being the only narrow one south of 51st that I can think of). East 79th isn't really set up like that, and because there are so many buses along that corridor, there's no guarantee that because a local has pulled up to a stop, there will be space for an X79 to pass. I'm otherwise in favor of such a route.

Oh trust me we make room to pass not matter where were at on 79th.