CHICAGO: Transit Developments

[Busy Bee]

Assuming electrification, it may be easier and cheaper (than a soft ground TBM bored tunnel), to instead branch off the NCS and into the median of 190 using cut and cover and alongside the Blue Line tracks at grade and re-entering a widened or new parallel tunnel for the final 3000' or so to get into a new shared regional rail/Cta terminal station.

[nomarandlee]

I still think the cheapest and best option would be to extend the ATS a few hundreads yards running perpendicular to the current NCS O'Hare station.
An even cheaper and more practical option would be to retrofit an enclosed ped tunnel to the ATS Rental Car station from the current NSC O'Hare station.

I took the NCS from Prospect Heights to Terminal 2 a few months ago and once you are on the ATS it is not too bad in terms of convenience to the rest of the airport other than the open-air walk of a few hundred feet between the two stations. Take out that walking segment and you can easily find a target market who would use the service, particularly those leaving from T5.

[VKChaz]

This Chicago Tribune op ed from July raises the issue of a connection between the North Western and Amtrak tracks. Is such a thing possible and is there any chance it (or any alternative) would actually be seriously studied and put into motion?

In September 2022, the Department of Buildings issued a permit for the construction of a 33-story apartment building at 350 N. Canal St. This past May, the new tower welcomed its first tenants.
But when the city signed off on the new building, it inadvertently foreclosed on the possibility of a critically needed regional transportation asset: 350 N. Canal blocks a potential connection of the former Chicago & North Western Railway’s tracks serving the Ogilvie Transportation Center with the Amtrak main line that brings trains from north of the city into Amtrak’s Chicago Union Station.

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If CMAP does decide to contemplate a Union Pacific-Union Station hookup, there may just be one opportunity left to make it happen. The Union Pacific still uses one of the old ground-level tracks to deliver tankcars of corn syrup to the east side of the Blommer Chocolate Co. factory at Kinzie and Des Plaines streets. Blommer has announced it will soon close that facility and sell the property for demolition and redevelopment. IDOT, CMAP, CDOT, Metra, Amtrak and UP need to sit down and study whether the Blommer tracks that now stub on the north side of Kinzie can be extended across Kinzie into the one block of Jefferson Street between Kinzie and the Amtrak main line. At the south end of that block, the track could be curved eastward to join the Amtrak alignment into Union Station.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2024/...ation-ogilvie/

[Randomguy34]

f CMAP does decide to contemplate a Union Pacific-Union Station hookup, there may just be one opportunity left to make it happen. The Union Pacific still uses one of the old ground-level tracks to deliver tankcars of corn syrup to the east side of the Blommer Chocolate Co. factory at Kinzie and Des Plaines streets. Blommer has announced it will soon close that facility and sell the property for demolition and redevelopment. IDOT, CMAP, CDOT, Metra, Amtrak and UP need to sit down and study whether the Blommer tracks that now stub on the north side of Kinzie can be extended across Kinzie into the one block of Jefferson Street between Kinzie and the Amtrak main line. At the south end of that block, the track could be curved eastward to join the Amtrak alignment into Union Station.

Oh geez, that sounds like hell trying to connect those two points. I'm not even sure if Metra's rolling stock would be able to make sharp enough turns for such a connection

[k1052]

Originally Posted by nomarandlee

An even cheaper and more practical option would be to retrofit an enclosed ped tunnel to the ATS Rental Car station from the current NSC O'Hare station.

Yeah just do an elevated connecting walkway around the north side of the CONRAC.

[Tcmetro]

I thought that there was some kind of funding awarded to add a walkway through the garage between the Metra station and the ATS.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by Tcmetro

I thought that there was some kind of funding awarded to add a walkway through the garage between the Metra station and the ATS.

Going thru the garage at the 2nd floor level would be ideal since it lines up with the ATS concourse and the hallway could (maybe) be climate-controlled, but that would require new elevators at the east end of the garage.

It's probably gonna end up as an outdoor covered walkway over the existing sidewalk.

[VKChaz]

City still working on a Greyhound and inter-city bus solution

Greyhound says it's close to lease extension at West Loop station

https://chicago.suntimes.com/transpo...-station-lease

Transit advocates have urged the city to buy the Greyhound station or build a new one. The city has said it doesn’t have the money.

If Greyhound loses its station, Chicago would be the largest city in the Northern Hemisphere without a bus station with indoor accommodations, the Chaddick Institute reported last month.

Is there a way the existing site could support a multi-use structure that generates revenue from above a station or is that not feasible on that footprint?

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by VKChaz

Is there a way the existing site could support a multi-use structure that generates revenue from above a station or is that not feasible on that footprint?

Structurally, there's no reason they can't build it that way. But the unspoken assumption from everyone is that Greyhound riders are icky, and nobody in their right mind would ever rent an apartment or office space above the bus station. Ald. Conway is trying to shove it even further south, a longer walk from Metra/CTA connections and (importantly) far from the existing condos/apts in that area.

[Busy Bee]

This is without a doubt an "Only in America" situation. Economic inequality on full display. "Intercity bus is for the poors... who gives a shit?"

[Randomguy34]

Good news: CREATE got ~$300 million in funding to rebuild the 75th St Corridor, which is a key component in eventually moving the Southwest Service to LaSalle St Station and increasing service. Hopefully it's future-proofed for restoring stations along 75th St at Western, Damen, Ashland, and Halsted.

Bad news: Still no funding for a ramp connecting Illinois Central/MED to Union Station via the St. Charles Air Line, even though it is an Amtrak priority project. At this point I'm convinced someone must really hate the idea of improving Union Station

https://www.transportation.gov/brief...ion-bipartisan

[ardecila]

Nobody is handing CHIP $3B all at once, which is unfortunate, but work to renovate Union Station is certainly moving forward. Right now it's broken into 3 separate projects. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59SEdAT-tPY

Work on the mail platforms (1) is moving forward, and construction should begin next year. It'll be kinda like temporary gates at an airport. Once it's open, then several of the existing tracks can be taken out of service and those platforms widened, with new street level access points (2). Those first two are fully funded. There's also a design effort underway to renovate the concourse, which could include some dramatic/soaring new spaces (3). You can see some renderings in the video, it reminds me of some of the renderings I've seen for Penn Station in NY.

[Tom In Chicago]

Originally Posted by ardecila

But the unspoken assumption from everyone is that Greyhound riders are icky, and nobody in their right mind would ever rent an apartment or office space above the bus station.

Correct. . . although I don't know how "unspoken" these assumptions are. . . I see icky people all the time over here by the bus station. . . icky, drug addled, passed out on the sidewalk on a dope nod people. . . as well as the ones that supply the icky people with their dope - which I'm sure they conveniently use the storage facilities across the street for. . .

Good fucking riddance. . .

. . .

[ardecila]

^ Sounds like a policing problem, then. Bus riders shouldn't have to suffer with getting dropped off in the middle of nowhere because 1% of them have addiction issues.

[Randomguy34]

Originally Posted by ardecila

Nobody is handing CHIP $3B all at once, which is unfortunate, but work to renovate Union Station is certainly moving forward. Right now it's broken into 3 separate projects. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59SEdAT-tPY

Thanks for sharing, the potential concourse designs look really nice. I'm also glad that they managed to convince the Old Post Office owners to allow for a passenger hold room. It'll be unfortunate if the only way to reach the new platforms is by going through the concourse and crossing active tracks. The OPO owners are pretty strict about any public access to their river plaza.

Do you know why Amtrak has recently been requesting $3 billion for CHIP? I know all the projects in the presentation were the original requests, which still comes out to ~$800 million. I've been trying to figure out the past year what other stuff could possibly be adding to the new figure, maybe A-2 and the new Fulton Market station?

[llamaorama]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

This is without a doubt an "Only in America" situation. Economic inequality on full display. "Intercity bus is for the poors... who gives a shit?"

Yeah, I know right.

I love trains and wish there was fast, frequent intercity service, but some of these state funded Amtrak regional rail projects are money sinks. $50 billion here or there to run 1 train a day to Keokuk or Dubuque or some other town with a funny name where a person only occupies 10 out of the 1000 seats on a train that weighs a lot and uses enormous amounts of fuel to move.

You could do the same thing with a bus for these routes and it would be more efficient.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by Randomguy34

Thanks for sharing, the potential concourse designs look really nice. I'm also glad that they managed to convince the Old Post Office owners to allow for a passenger hold room. It'll be unfortunate if the only way to reach the new platforms is by going through the concourse and crossing active tracks. The OPO owners are pretty strict about any public access to their river plaza.

Like I said, it will be like temporary gates at an airport, at least initially. It'll feel like a hike from the existing concourse.

Long-term, Amtrak needs to think about where the intended access points should be at street level. The red brick "Sugar House" building sits on top of that passenger hold room, and that building was always envisioned to be torn down. Possibly it could become a new tower/dropoff plaza with an Amtrak entrance lobby off Harrison. This would be similar to NYP where Amtrak goes out of "Moynihan" while NJT goes out of "Penn", really just two concourses of the same station but each translates to a different place in the street grid.

Do you know why Amtrak has recently been requesting $3 billion for CHIP? I know all the projects in the presentation were the original requests, which still comes out to ~$800 million. I've been trying to figure out the past year what other stuff could possibly be adding to the new figure, maybe A-2 and the new Fulton Market station?

I'm not really sure. I think there's a "full vision" which includes dramatic changes to Union Station, entirely new yard facilities, new track corridors and connections, etc - then there's the "fiscally constrained" version which is a series of discrete projects addressing the most urgent needs and the ones that are most feasible right now.

I'm not aware of any CHIP projects on the north side of CUS, although Amtrak has studied a 4th main track before and there is room to add one. A-2 is a Metra project and (I think) the current plan is to position it as one piece of a bigger O'Hare Express project on the NCS corridor.