CTA Tattler

CTA Brown Line tip: Use first or last cars

The CTA noted in a press release today that the first and last cars of the new eight-car Brown Line trains typically had more room for riders. It seems Brown riders are standing in their usual spots and not taking full advantage of the longer trains.

The CTA also noted that three-tracking operations today "went well and there were no major service disruptions." Hmmm, well, some of the commenters on this thread beg to differ.

The CTA further reported: "The travel time for a southbound Red Line trip from Wilson to the Loop averaged only three minutes longer than normal. Brown Line trips averaged five minutes longer from Irving Park to the Loop."

Standing-room-only cars to ease rush hour congestion?

During our chat with CTA President Ron Huberman a week ago, he asked our opinion on a few ideas that CTA is considering.

One of those ideas is about a way to ease train overcrowding and congestion during the morning and evening rush hours. Huberman said the CTA was toying with the idea of stripping the old 2200 series El cars of all seats and dropping two of them into a set of eight cars -- creating two standing-room-only train cars without seats during the morning and evening rush hours.

He said the cars would be clearly marked and announced by the motormen. These cars are currently used only on the Brown Blue Line, and would be the first taken out of service when the new trains cars are delivered in 2010.

So, what do you think? Is this a good idea? To add capacity during the rush hours? Or would you avoid them? Personally, I told Ron it's worth trying out at least to see whether riders like the idea. But tell us what you think in the click poll.

CTA home page redesign a slight improvement

Without fanfare, the CTA on Friday unveiled a redesigned home page for its Web site. It's an improvement, but just barely.

The biggest improvement is adding the Trip Planner to the home page.  Otherwise, it's pretty much just a dusting off of the old page.

Two big disappointments:

1. There's still no search function.
2. The redesign is confined to the home page. All the content pages inside the site still have the same, old tired design.

It would have been nice to apply the home page navigation to all site pages. As it is, there's no easy way to get back to the home page from a content.

I really expected better, and frankly I'm disappointed.

Three-track Hell, Part 2? Only time will tell

Phase 2 of the CTA's three-tracking project begins Sunday, March 30. Time will tell how disruptive it will be to the morning commutes.

Phase 1 was somewhat painful, but not quite as bad as was predicted. Some suggest the evening commute is spread out over more hours than the morning commute, which is why there's more angst over Phase 2.

For the record, all Red, Brown and Purple Line trains will share one track at Belmont and Fullerton stations southbound starting Monday for about a year. Four fewer Red Line trains will operate during the morning rush period. Also, four fewer Brown Line trains will run during that time, but capacity on the Brown Line should be about the same since all Brown Line trains will run eight cars during peak hours starting March 30.

Also, additional southbound Red Line trains will be staged south of Fullerton to provide more capacity into the Loop. However, that won't help people on the mid-North Side get on packed and scarcer Red line trains.

Also Sunday, Southport and Diversey stations on the Brown Line will open. Wellington and Paulina will close.

I will be timing my Red Line commute to see how much worse it is. You can post your stories here in this thread.

Three garbage deposit alternatives

Motorman on a Red Line train at Chicago:

"Attention passengers. If you have garbage, we'd rather you just kept it on the train than throw it on the platform. We have people who clean the trains." (A person apparently had tossed garbage out the door at the Chicago stop.)

So, does that mean no one cleans the platforms? Of course they do, because not too far north on the same run we saw a CTA employee cleaning a different platform.

But how about Plan C for you garbage tossers:

Throw it away in a proper receptacle when you leave the train.

Other rail challenges, solutions

This is another post in a series of notes from our coffee with CTA President Ron Huberman.

Huberman mentioned that maintaining the older rail cars and tracks are a big challenge for the agency. As part of the project to repair slow zones, the CTA is replacing all rail ties with plastic ties and using special e-clips.

The goal is to restore all track areas to sustain top speeds of 70 miles per hour. The Blue Line stretch from Addison to O’Hare will be the first to achieve that goal later this year. Currently, the top speed is 55 mph.

Huberman stressed that in order to reduce slow zones by Thanksgiving to about 6% of the tracks, this summer will feature painfully delayed rail trips, especially on weekends.

Adam Case, the CTA’s chief of customer communications, reported that within a month riders can enroll to receive a weekly email blast about the week’s upcoming construction news.

Case also mentioned the CTA Web site would get a much-needed redesign in April. Sometime shortly thereafter, riders will be able to get real-time information from the site on when their next train arrives.

The CTA also will soon roll out a digital network of eight 52-inch LCD screens at the platform and pay-station levels. One feature will be a “countdown clock” till the time when the next train will arrive in the station.

Huberman said the $20 million digital network will be entirely paid for and maintained by a vendor, who will sell advertising.

No audio on TVs in new train cars

Everyone, please, relax: The CTA has confirmed there will be NO audio on the TVs that will be set in place of the advertising cards in the rail cars to be put into service in 2010.

Also, they don't cost the CTA a dime because they'll be paid for by the advertising.

They'll be shielded by thick plexiglass, so they will be hard to vandalize. But I suppose if there's a will there's a way.

UPDATE: Rusty makes a good point in his comment that I want to re-emphasize here. It's the ad vendor's responsibility to repair/replace anything that might go wrong with these little TVs. So if they are vandalized, they will be replaced at their expense, not the CTA's.

More coffee notes: Problems, ideas on the rails

Here's the second installment of notes from our coffee with CTA President Ron Huberman, where he discusses rail issues.

Huberman bluntly stated that not having enough train cars is the biggest problem facing the CTA on “the rail side” of the house. “We have 1,200 cars but really need 1,600,” he said.

Plagued by an aging system with little capital funding on the horizon, the CTA can’t find parts anymore for its oldest cars, the 2200 series with the bifold doors. But Huberman said the CTA will take delivery of more than 400 new cars by 2010.

Huberman pulled out a slick presentation on the new rail cars out of his briefcase and shared with us the new design for those rails cars, which he stressed is not totally final. The first 10 cars will be delivered this fall, though they won’t be outfitted with the exact final configuration.

Here are some key features:

• Recessed lighting.
• Reading lights.
• Six 9-inch TV screens in each car, rotating CTA info and advertising.
• No more advertising cards -- the small TVs are replacing all paper ad cards.
• Computerized Internet controls mean no more herky-jerky rides.
• A “smart” systems map in the middle of the car pinpointing the train’s current location.
• The same number of seats arranged longitudinally to allow for more standing room.
• A padded “butt perch” in the area where a wheelchair would go so if there was no disabled passenger onboard, other passengers could rest against the padded perch.

In one of the funnier lines of the meeting, Ron noted that on current trains “we assure that every sense is assaulted” with harsh, bright lighting and a cold design.

Huberman wouldn’t let me take a photo of the new design, explaining it had only been decided on last week, and that we were the first to see it outside of CTA headquarters. Besides, the details are not yet final.  In the photo with this post, Huberman holds a page showing the older-type seating. Those seats would not be used in the new train cars.

Notes from coffee with Ron: Major bus initiatives

As I noted last week, CTA President Ron Huberman asked me to pull together a small group of CTA Tattler readers to sit down with him over coffee and talk about CTA initiatives and hear their concerns. We did that on March 22. Here's the first of a series of reports, this one on bus initiatives.

Huberman said a current project to tackle the bus bunching problem is to measure the “big gaps” between buses and reduce them. A “big gap” would be double the interval time if it’s supposed to be five minutes. But if the interval is supposed to be 15 minutes, a big gap would be more than 15 minutes.

He said the CTA started on the 15 worst routes on the system. He identified four major problems impacting the bunching/gapping problem.

1. Garage-related. Not pulling out on time or equipment-related problems. Currently getting rid of the worst buses, and not just by model and year. Huberman noted that bus breakdowns have dropped dramatically in the last few months.
2. Discipline-related. Drivers not leaving on time. GPS systems in each bus measure departure times. Garage general managers are held accountable for on-time performance. In fact, Huberman said he has terminated three of eight general managers since he came on board in May 2007. The other factor is operator behavior. The CTA has begun ranking drivers’ on-time performance relative to their peers, and are looking for ways to reward the top performers. Already there’s a healthy competition among drivers.
3. Street conditions. There may be trucks blocking a street, causing delays. Or there might be more stops for disabled riders to board.
4. Scheduling problems. The current schedule may not make sense. For instance, if a bus consistently arrives back at the garage 15 minutes past scheduled time, the CTA would look at and revise the schedule.

Huberman also mentioned the CTA is ramping up hiring to improve bus cleaning efforts. And it’s using innovative methods to hire the 200 people they need.

For instance, this summer it will hire high school kids, as well as ex-offenders. Huberman noted that we wouldn’t truly see the results of stepped-up bus cleaning efforts until the summer.

Finally, the CTA president said by Thanksgiving, the CTA will have retired all of the 4400 and 5300 series buses first put into service in 1991.

Special note: Some of you wondered how you could be invited to this coffee. First, I apologize that I couldn't invite everyone. Obviously, that would be a logistical nightmare. So I first invited a few people I knew personally, and then a few others who comment often here and whose email addresses I have.

Many of you comment here with fake email addresses. That's fine, but I can't contact you personally in case I want to follow up on something. And remember, only I can see the email addresses -- no one else can.

Ron promised he would meet with us at least twice a year. If you'd like to be invited to the next chat with Huberman, please email me and I'll add you to the list.

Bus tracker expansion set for April 7

During Saturday's coffee with CTA President Ron Huberman, he mentioned the CTA would announce on Monday the 20 bus routes that will be part of the first expansion of the CTA's GPS bus tracker project.

But as ChicagoBus.org reports, the CTA already has posted signs along 13 bus routes out of the Archer garage about the coming bus tracker expansion. The routes are:

• #35 35th
• #39 Pershing
• #43 43rd
• #49 Western
• #X49 Western Express
• #54B South Cicero
• #55A 55th/Austin
• #55N 55th/Narragansett
• #62 Archer
• #62H Archer/Harlem
• #63W West 63rd
• #94 South California
• #165 West 65th

After the debut on August 2005 of Bus Tracker on the #20 Madison, the CTA was supposed to expand it last summer. However, the hardware installation proved more expensive than originally projected. Plus, the CTA didn't want to outfit the 1991 buses it plans to retire later this year.

The plan is to roll out more routes each month.

(Photo from chicagobus.org)