CTA Riders Aren't Happy With New "L" Car Seating

By Chuck Sudo in News on Aug 27, 2012 9:30PM

Remember the swell reception two years ago when CTA introduced the new Bombardier 5000-series rail cars?

The honeymoon’s over, everyone. If it ever existed.

Tribune transportation columnist John Hilkevitch collected complaints from riders on the Green and Pink Lines, where the cars are currently in use, as a counter to the spin from CTA that riders think the new cars are swank.

The complaints seem centered on one aspect of the cars—the seating. It seems as though riders don’t like the New York-style aisle seating and the attendant increase in rush hour crotch and ass views as more passengers board. Another problem with the aisle seating is that they don’t seem to accommodate the frame of the average Chicagoan.

That’s right. Where it was expected to see a larger person would take up two seats in the older model “L” cars, where seating is installed in rows, the thought of touching thighs with Tiny McPorterhouse and bumping into other passengers if a train conductor has a hard stop has turned off a lot of people riding in the new cars.

Gerald Johnson, a rider of the Green Line for 25 years, voiced his complaints to Hilkevitch.

"You are cramped in a space between two poles that weren't meant to accommodate two normal-size adults," Johnson said. "Then your feet are constantly being stepped on in the common center aisle."

Rider Rob Kleps said standing passengers hang on to the straps like “sides of beef.” Another rider, Judi Zink, told Hilkevitch.

"My observation is that people are even less likely to make eye contact, much less communicate, and it seems we sit closer to each other with the new seating configuration. I can spy on someone's texting a little more easily."

Of course, “normal-size adults” is a relative term in the Hog Butcher of the World. But CTA had these cars designed so that they could accommodate more standing passengers. Currently 100 of the 5000-series cars are in use on the Green and Pink Lines, with the Red Line getting them in November, followed by the Orange, Purple and Yellow Lines. As far as complaints about the new cars, we can get used to the new seating. It’s the parts flaws that led to the cars being pulled from the transit system last year with which people should be more concerned.

We can live with sitting next to an obese person reading our texts and judging our music library, so long as the train we’re both riding doesn’t derail.