Chicago's Transit System

Chicago has a large, and in my opinion ineffective, transit system. Ranging from buses, to the L to the large commuter Metra trains. In addition to being plentiful and mismanaged, all the elements of the Chicago transit system have something else in common, they are all incredibly dated and in desperate need of a redesign. Where this money comes from is anyones guess. All the news I hear is that the city is broke, but this is all hearsay, and the mayor seems to be doing a well enough job. Regardless, its not my place or interest to debate how the mayor is doing, or where the money is coming from. I like to focus on the design and experience of our city. I'm no bean counter.

Back to the lecture at hand. First lets discuss how desperately Chicago needs more L lines, specifically ones that run not into the city, but around it. The way its set up right now is like spokes on a wheel, with all roads leading to Rome. While getting into the city is easy enough, problems occur when I'm trying to get somewhere parallel to my location. Example: I lived in Evanston for about a year a half, taking the purple line in and out. But if I wanted to get to O'Hare, I had to go all the way into the city and take the blue back out. What we really need is a second "wheel" that circles the city. If these coincided with L stops that would be fantastic. Fat chance since the CTA is cutting transit routs.

One positive thing that the CTA has been doing is updating and modernizing of many their stops, such as the beautiful new Belmont station. In fact most lines along the red/purple/brown seem to be getting a much needed makeover, and from what I have seen, they are fairly modern, although I would have added more screens to generate advertising dollars. The trains however are fugly at best. They are still using faux wood paneling on the inside of the L trains! Who decided this, and why is the company that manufactures these trains still think that we as commuters want to feel like we are in the olden days of wooden trains and horse drawn buggies?? I would love to take a stab at redesigning the L trains. I would make them use less energy, easier to maintain/clean and improve the commuting experience by incorporating larger windows on the sides and top.

The buses need improvements as well, I know that the city bought lots of new hybrid buses from New Flyer, but I don't think I have seen any of them driving around. While the design of them is so so, I think it can be modernized even further. I have not seen what the insides of these look like, but it has to be an improvement over past models. One way to improve revenue and patronage is to improve the experience of the commuter. I'm not saying to make taking the bus glamorous, maybe just enjoyable and modern.

Lastly, the Metra trains. The hulking, two floor, green windowed and often delayed behemoths of the Chicago transit system. While these trains are generally cleaner and often have much more seating than L trains, they still smack of an 80's suburban movie. I feel like my mom should be picking me up in a station wagon with wood paneling. This whole experience needs to be modernized and transformed. This is, for many, THE experience when coming into the city. Example: suburban family lives too far out for the L, goes into the city to catch a Cubs game. Instead of feeling like they are taking an experience into the 3 largest city in America, they could be on any other crappy, 1980's commuter train out there. They should market themselves as an experience, not an alternative to traffic. Oh, and PS Metra... your trains from the suburbs are only marginally faster to get downtown than braving the Chicago rush hour. I was sad to see the alcohol train go. Although I never actually got to go into this train, I wanted to. Although some said that it was $50 just to get inside. I can understand though it being that high, having to pay for insurance and a liquor license, then to have to drop drunk train riders off at their cars, maybe not the best idea. Bu I think something else should go in its place, hell a smoothy bar would be better than nothing.