CTA Tattler

"Moorhead" leads to CTA firing suit

Above was the headline in Monday's Sun-Times, and it pretty much sums up the situation for a 22-year CTA worker who was fired after some sexually charged phone banter with a woman on CTA business.

The Sun-Times reports:

"It began as a telephone conversation between a CTA employee and a CTA customer.

"By the time it was over, officials say, the employee -- Bob Bono -- was making inappropriate remarks to the woman, asking if she lived alone, and making repeated comments about a town near where she grew up in Minnesota.

"Moor . . . head," he is accused of saying, allegedly stretching out its pronunciation in a suggestive manner so it had a sexual connotation. "That's a funny name for a town."

Bono admitted that he shouldn't have engaged in a personal conversation with the woman, but denies any sexual innuendo in the chat.

The Sun-Times quoted Bono's lawyer: "We've become so uptight in America about anybody complaining about anything racial or sexual, public bodies are so afraid of lawsuits, they fire people. It's absolutely disgusting."

"CTA spokeswoman Noelle Gaffney said "this was about the integrity of the privacy policy we provide our customers when they provide personal information to us, and this was a gross abuse of that."

Feds scrutinize CTA headquarters furniture deal

Federal prosecutors are combing through CTA records regarding the purchase of new furniture when the transit agency moved into its new headquarters at Lake and Clinton.

It's all about a band of brothers - the Daley-connected Degnan brothers.

The Tribune reports: "The [$5.9 million worth of] furniture was supplied by Desks Inc., a 50-year-old company once owned by Patrick Degnan, brother of Timothy Degnan, a top political strategist for Mayor Richard Daley. The firm received the business through Fifield Companies, a Chicago development company that the CTA hired in 2002--after Degnan sold the furniture business--to design, construct and furnish the building.

"Another Degnan brother, Robert, has been the CTA's general manager of system maintenance support since 2002, a post that pays about $102,000 annually, according to CTA records. The job puts Robert Degnan in charge of CTA's non-revenue vehicle fleet, such as maintenance vehicles, the CTA's Noelle Gaffney said.

"Contacted Tuesday at Desks Inc., Patrick Degnan said he owned the company from 1979 to 2001 and is a consultant now.

"I think that I've answered what I can," he said, before hanging up the phone."

Meanwhile, on the bus strike front, last week we got first good news then bad news. Earlier in the week, it looked like the strike wouldn't happen till July, if it did.

Then later, the CTA union burst our bubble and said there still was a chance of a strike by bus drivers much sooner than that.

The good news is that before they do call a strike, the CTA union will let an arbitrator rule on its grievance over rostering.

Free CTA rides for pigeons

The Tribune's Q section today reports on pigeons hitching rides on CTA trains, with quotes from your intrepid CTA reporter here.

Here are just a couple of stories about my encounters with pigeons on the CTA:

Pigeon attacks Purple Line!

Promenading pigeons on parade

CTA ignores dead pigeon

Giving up your seat? That's gratitude for ya

Vic shared an interesting story about giving up his seat to a pregnant woman. That has been a much-discussed topic around here. Vic's story is a little different:

Well, it was an interesting time to say the least on the commute back home yesterday evening. I was on the usually harmless Brown Line heading home, and the train was pretty packed due to delays. I got a seat though, thankfully. Two stops later, a pregnant woman gets on and I take my headphones off, stand up and courteously offer her my seat (as I usually do with senior citizens and pregnant women). She looked at me, said "No," and I asked "are you sure you wouldn't like to sit down?"

The woman gives me a disgusted look and says, "Are you fucking deaf or just stupid? I said no." So I mumbled "Whatever" and sat down. I figured it was done and over with, I wasn't going to make anything of it, that is, until she says: "If I wasn't pregnant you wouldn't have offered me a seat."

Now, for whatever reason, that just didn't sit too well with me because all I was doing up to this point was being nice and courteous to her, and she just responded to my good intentions with an insult. Needless to say, I got pissed off and said, "That's true, and I wouldn't offer it to you now either after seeing how much of a fucking bitch you are."

I then put my headphones on, raised the volume, and drowned her out the rest of the train ride. I'm sure she cursed me out, but I didn't hear her. Right before I put my headphones on, I heard gasps from some and laughter from others because my half of the train heard/saw everything.

Top o' the mornin' to ya

A tip of my green hat and Happy St. Patrick Day best wishes to all my readers, from your 100% Irish CTA reporter.

Don't get too nutty out there tonight. Especially if you're starting this afternoon by watching the NCAA tournament.

And if things DO get too nutty, be sure and take the CTA home!

Update on CTA passenger communications efforts, CTA alerts system

I've been very critical in the past about the CTA's efforts to communicate service outages and delays to passengers. In fact, I tried to remedy the problem by working with my brother Dan to create a wireless alert system that notifies riders by SMS cell phone and email messages about outages and delays.

By way of update, I can say that the CTA has greatly improved its efforts to communicate problems to riders. On some mornings, I've been inundated with both loudspeaker announcements as well as CTA alerts about various system problems. The CTA itself has by far been the most active participant in our wireless alerts.

I've also seen comments here remarking on the CTA's improved communications. And you guys are tough critics. So CTA, keep up the good work. But given the fact that we're all still human and can improve, what ideas for  improvements in communications efforts do you guys have for our CTA pals?

CTA wireless alerts update: As I mentioned above, the 400-plus subscribers to CTA wireless alerts have gotten great information in the last eight months about service outages and problem areas.

We've heard from the CTA about the Davis station closing because of wind-blown debris, bus reroutes due to fires, switching problems causing delays on the Red Line, and station closures caused by doofuses leaving unattended packages.

You riders also have shared excellent information gleaned from motormen and CTA personnel.

Unfortunately, there's also been a recent spate of stupid alerts. That has to stop. And we've taken action to boot the worst offenders from our alert network.

So hang in there, all you great CTA alert users. That was just a small bump in the road.

Delayed police action confuses riders

Here's an interesting Tattler Tale from Brock. Thanks for sharing!

I arrived at the Clinton Green Line stop for the usual quick trip inbound to the Red Line to hear a PA announcement that service had been suspended due to police activity at California. I was in the midst of typing a message to CTA Alerts when another PA announcement delivered the news that service was restored and there was a 3 minute delay – nothing too notable about that.

An inbound train soon arrived and I hustled to the closest door. As people filed in and out a guy was partially blocking the door. I made a grumble about door blockers under my breath and found a place to stand. The doors remained open and the door-blocker stood halfway out of the door. He made some sort of affirmative nod towards the motorman and we were off. As he came back in the car I noticed that he had a gun belt and what I thought might be a police uniform shirt under his plain back coat.

As we left Clinton a guy closer to the other door started ranting and raving. As we crossed the river and got closer to the loop his ranting got louder and more violent. (Apparently he was ‘representin’ the West side, and no politician, woman, member of a number of racial groups, and more weren’t going to stop him ‘representin’ the thug life.) Other people in the car were clearly disturbed. I kept making eye contact with the maybe-cop-door-blocker hoping if he was a cop he’d intervene. Since he didn’t I figured he must be a security guard. We were delayed at switch into the loop and while the ranting continued, the I-guess-he’s-a-security guard guy did a little ancy-dance and uttered “come on…” under his breath.

As we approached Clark and Lake, most of the people around the ranter got up to escape, but as we pull into the station I see a whole mess of Chicago’s finest and a CTA attendant there to meet us. Turns out there were 3 or 4 undercover cops in addition to my not-so-hidden buddy riding in the car. They escorted Mr. Thug off the car and after a brief delay we were on our way.

Glad to know that the police are actually there when you need them, but I sure do wish I knew what the first part of the story was and why they didn’t get this guy off sooner.

The 120-pound linebacker

A crowd of people swarm onto the Red Line south at Bryn Mawr, each one jockeying for one of he scarce few remaining empty seats.

In particular, I witness a 120-pound, 50-ish Asian woman, push and shove and elbow out of the way a 140-pound woman in her late 20s.

The woman has an incredulous look on her face, just shaking her head as she finds a spot to stand in the aisle.

Take my lunch, please

Headed north out of Howard on the Purple Line, a huge hulk of a man sits across from a 40-ish woman with red hair. He wore filthy clothes -- from his vest to his boots with no laces.

He struck up a conversation with the woman. "You know. you're pretty cool. Most times when I talk to people on the North Side, they go like this" -- and he made a sour, disdainful face.

Then he said,  "Do you have anything to eat? I usually ask for food instead of money, because when you ask people for money on the North Side, they go like this" -- and he made the same sour, disdainful face.

She said, "Well, you could have my lunch," and she handed over a paper bag. He opened it, and pulled out a peeled, sectioned grapefruit half. "What the fuck is this? A grapefruit?"

The redhead said, "If you don't want the grapefruit, just give it back." He said, No, no, I'll keep it for later. It will help boost my immune system." Then he stuffed it in his back pocket.

He poked through the rest of the bag, pulling out some ham slices and cheese. "Aw man, don't you have any crackers or bread or anything." He just shook his head and started stuffing the ham into his mouth.

When he was done, he said, "Do you like the rock group Bon Jovi?"

She said, " I think they're sappy."

"Aw come on, I really like that song 'Wanted - Dead or Alive.' " Don't you?"

She got up to get off at Davis, and he said, "Have a nice day."

No word of thanks.

Toronto subway blog fights anagram map backlash

I've blogged here about the CTA anagram station map bye Jesse. These fun maps have popped up in many city, but in Toronto, the local transit authority there is trying to quash the map -- with great station names like Butt Rash and Only-Booger -- with a cease and desist order.

But a Toronto transit blog (let's hear it for local transit blogs!) is thumbing its nose at the TTC: "We view the TTC as belonging to the Toronto public and feel that celebrating the TTC through projects like the anagram map should be encouraged, not quashed."

Bully for you!

A London transit anagram map was similarly censored.