CTA Ridership Up, Services...Not So Much

By Margaret Lyons in News on Sep 2, 2008 7:10PM

Seatless El cars—which according to plans would be two cars out of an eight-car train—may start running as soon as October, Ron Huberman said today. "We're only going to use them in places where customers currently are standing anyway. They're standing because they can't get on a train. And so we're going to be using them in those corridors where we know we're leaving people on the platforms."

CTA ridership, and public transit ridership in general, is up, an the increase in passengers is straining an already barely-cutting-it system.

Delivery of new CTA rail cars—to replace trains that began service in 1969 and should have been retired more than a decade ago—remains at least two years away. In addition, the CTA has received only half of the 400 new buses it ordered to replace 1991 models that had been due for retirement in 2003.

The predicament leaves the transit agency no option except to attempt to recycle its existing equipment more quickly on routes and put supervisors on train platforms and at bus stops to improvise service changes to deal with waiting passengers.

The CTA provides about 1.7 million rides per day (like your mom! hayo) and is expecting to add about 200,000 more rides per weekday in the coming months. [Trib, WBBM, photo by rbabiera]