Results tagged “publictransit”

• Six more confirmed cases of Swine Flu have the grand total in the state of Illinois up to *drumroll* .... Nine.
• Meanwhile, Governor Quinn echoed the sentiment of common sense in saying that riding public transit did not pose any additional health risks.
• Chicago Public Schools and the teachers' union are squaring off over potential changes to the retirement plan.

I recently found myself on a nearly-empty Brown Line car during the early evening, when I realized that a man sitting next to me was masturbating. I kicked him and yelled at him to stop, which he did, and he left the train at the next stop. My immediate reaction was to feel relieved that I had so quickly recognized and taken control of the situation. And although I was grossed out, my prevailing feeling was: Fuck you, man. Nice try.

More hang-ups on Chicago’s bike sharing program: apparently no one can agree on who will be responsible if someone gets hurt.

So what’s the status on that city-wide bike-rental program that the Mayor’s office was touting late last year? Chicago is actively looking to imitate the structure of Paris's Vélib program, which is financed by private advertising company JCDecaux, but has not yet been able to settle on a contract. From the Sun-Times:

It's T-minus four days until "Doomsday I," and the storm clouds are gathering. Mayor Daley held a press conference at a bus stop yesterday, announcing that "This is do-or-die time." State legislators aren't in session right now, and won't be until Friday — gaaaah! cutting it close, guys! — but Mike Madigan thinks he can get his bill calling for a tax increase to fund transit through the House and the Senate. Madigan needs...

The US House subcommittee on highways and transit will conduct a hearing here on October 29 to determine what kinds of transit improvements Chicago would need before we could host the Olympics. Why yes, October 29 is a mere 6 days before our public transit system starts collapsing into itself like a dying star! "Mayor Richard Daley, Blagojevich, officials from the Regional Transportation Authority, the three transit agencies and the U.S. Olympic Committee will...

While we're pre-mourning the loss of basically all forms of public transit near our apartment if the CTA "doomsday" plan goes into effect in January, we never stopped to think about the true victim in this situation: Missed Connections. With fewer buses running, trains will inevitably be more crowded, eliminating the chance to make eyes with that guy with the Timbuk2 bag and iPod during your morning commute. The humanity!

We noticed a short Fran Spielman piece today reminding us about Daley's globe-trotting and found something we didn't expect — bikes! When we first read about Paris's new bicycle initiative, Velib, we salivated. The city peppered the city with more than 20,000 heavy-duty rental bikes in an effort to become a city of bikes. The program almost seems too good to be true. The bikes can be rented from 750 stations throughout the city, free...

Londonist are starting to think their city is getting just a little bit too expensive, when even Christian Slater can't afford to go out there. And there's no escaping, as local singer Lily Allen discovered when she was barred entry to the US. The British mapping agency caused further bad karma, by blocking a 3-D representation of London in Google Earth. But the smiles returned to Londonist's faces as they interviewed Baroness von Reichardt,...

Happy Father's Day! For those of you who have dads, are dads, or know dads, this one's for you, from all of us at the Gothamist network." It was a week of bizarre, embarassing headlines at DCist. The trial of the local administrative law judge who sued his cleaners for $54 million over a pair of missing pants left everyone shaking their heads. Then the capital city was nearly brought to its knees, twice, by...

Remember how some people thought the world was flat? That was their reality, and they believed in it with their hearts and souls. Now we can look back and know with certainty they were dead wrong. Well, today Chicagoist heard about an idea that sounds positively revolutionary, one that seems practically incomprehensible. But maybe it's just because we think we are so used to thinking the earth is flat, we can't possibly imagine a round planet.

Nearly all of us agree that Frank Kruesi was a big DB that couldn't keep the CTA from being in a continuous state of CF always leaving everyone going WTF? And it was with great hope that Chicagoist saw Ron Huberman come on board with promises of administrative cuts and just not being Frank Kruesi. However, over at Time Out Chicago, our old pal, Scott Smith, posted that, yet again, the CTA is threatening fare...

So it might be a good idea to look for alternate forms of transportation. Like biking and the CTA. Why not do a combo? The CTA is reminding us about the idea with Bike to Transit week. This week, the CTA is actively pimping their efforts to make it easier for people to combine bike riding with public transit. For instance, there are racks on every CTA bus that can carry two bikes, so...

As far as we know, we never rode a CTA train or bus in the presence of Frank Kruesi. Rumor has it he did it quite often, judging by the kinds of comments we heard when he was fired. We imagine the yellow jacket would be hard to miss. In the past, we doubt the CTA's new sheriff in town rode much with Kruesi, either. Ron Huberman (who for all the world looks to us...

Illinois Lieutenant Governor Pat Quinn

Spring appears to have, er, sprung, at least temporarily, in most of the Ist-A-Verse, so naturally, we're all feeling pretty good. (Yes, we know that spring doesn't start till later this month. Just let us enjoy our weather!) And that makes us that much more eager to share all of the nifty things we're up to...

Remember way back in January 2006 when the CTA raised their base rate from $1.75 to $2 a ride? Of course you do. Unless you're one of those people who never ride the CTA and use their car or bike to get everywhere, to which we say you're missing a vital, if dirty and malfunctioning, part of the city. Anyway. As you also might recall, there was a huge run on Chicago Cards at the eleventh hour, in order for people to avoid the extra 25¢ markup. A shortage soon occurred at stores and currency exchanges throughout Chicago. As a result, scores of people couldn't take advantage of the huge marketing ploy and ended up spending much more on their trips than was necessary.

Texas is thawing, the Northeast is freezing, and a sort of natural order seems almost restored to the Ist-A-Verse. Almost. Londonist HQ—that is to say, the city of London—was battered by heavy winds, making it a bad time to be a twelve-meter (nearly forty-foot) tall snowman. Still, not everyone decided to keep warmly covered. Meanwhile, back indoors, the Big Brother racism is now causing all kinds of headaches for international diplomats, and Londonist got into...

Happy Holidays! Chances are, you're reading this the day after Christmas, back at your day job after all-too-short a holiday, and the last thing you want from us is stuff about the holidays. But that's just too bad. Because, see, here in the Ist-a-verse, we do things ahead of time. It might be December 26 for you, but that's what you get for not checking your Favorite Local Blog on Christmas Eve. Austinist is...

Drive Less. Live More. The new slogan and website from the Regional Transportation Authority is mostly aimed at providing details and tools for using public transportation. The tools are not necessarily new, some have been around for year, but it is great that the RTA has finally put all of these together in a central site. The site contains commuter calculators, which estimated for us that if we drove to work we would be spending...

All of us at the Chicagoist offices are huge fans of the city's public transit. Sure, it's stinky, and the schedules are polite fictions at best, but by God, it gets us to where we need to go without us having to worry about contributing to the world's problems by disproportionately consuming energy and fossil fuels. (We're also very pleased that we don't have to contribute to the insurance industry coffers, and that we're not...

Torontoist visits the site of a new Frank Gehry structure, stalks "the elusive Bahamas streetcar", and watches Tom Green get surgery. Phillyist rejoices in the Phillies' wild card chances, mourns the injuries sustained by Eagles defensive end Jevon Kearse, and goes pirate on our asses. SFist notes that Guns and Roses were in town, that San Franciscans are taking over reality TV, and that the San Francisco Chronicle's skills of original nomenclature could use some...

Breaking the law, breaking the law We -ist folks love us some crime, and no misdemeanor is too petty for a post on any of our sites. This week, join us for a rogues' gallery of miscreants major, minor, and alleged. Gothamist gets us started with "Law & Order", muppet style. Oh, you know what isn't a crime? Taking pictures on the MTA. So, why are cops stopping photographers? In other Gotham crime, a...

into cars, since we rely on public transit to get us around the city, we must say that we thought the video Q&A is pretty cool.

Kevin O'Neil, CTA Tattler

Chicagoist has mixed feelings about the proposed Fordham Spire (a.k.a Chicago’s next tallest building). It’d be an innovative structure by a celebrated “star-chitecht” that plays well with its neighbors. But does Chicago need another insanely tall skyscraper? Is this a fitting next chapter in the history of Chicago architecture? Three free, informative exhibits at the Chicago Architecture Foundation’s ArchiCenter provide some perspective. In 1972, five up-and-coming architects wrote “Five Architects”, a manifesto detailing how they’d...

Bus Chatterbox

An article published yesterday in the Christian Science Monitor shows that the CTA is not the only public transit organization in the nation that has had to deal with a budget crunch. In the past couple of years, public transit systems in New York, Boston, and Washington, D.C. have all raised fares and Philadelphia is threatening to do the same. Pittsburgh cut service and raised fares. This month San Francisco is also holding hearings to consider service cuts and increased fares. The president of the American Public Transportation Association blames increasing costs of fuel, liability insurance, healthcare, and pensions for the nation's public transit problems.

One of the most inexplicable inequities in Chicago public transit are the differences between Metra heavy rail service and the Metra Electric Line. The Electric Line, which terminates at the Randolph Street station and runs mostly through Chicago's South Side African American neighborhoods and suburbs, has continually been plagued by some subtle, and not so subtle differences that grate the patience of riders, and regularly attract charges of racism. Enter recently-appointed State Senator Kwame Raoul.

Why, why, why does all of River North smell like chocolate and/or brownies? I get off the Red Line at Grand and I immediately crave chocolate. Can someone please explain?