Chicago transit a pricey, vast morass
Seventy-five million dollars was paid to the owners of the Chicago Surface Lines and $12 million to the Chicago Rapid Transit Co. per a Chicago Tribune article on Oct. 1, 1947.
Surface Lines had placed its assets in voluntary bankruptcy under the jurisdiction of Judge Michael I. Igoe of the Federal District Court for protection. The 'L' lines had been in receiver-ship since 1933, barely making payroll.
During World War II, when every transit system in the country (including the Chicago Surface Lines) was strained to the utmost putting every available streetcar in service, Rapid Transit in Chicago had no increase in ridership.
The Halsted line carried 124,094 passengers per day; Clark-Wentworth, 120,560; Broadway-State, 102,404. Surface Lines carried 3.5 million riders per day. Rapid Transit, at best, carried 66,000.
Chicago Surface Lines employed 15,000 people, had 16 car stations, and operated 3,659 street cars on 1,110 miles of track. By June 20, 1958, this going enterprise had been wiped off the face of the Earth.
For 3½ years, flames and smoke bellowed from the bus garage at 77th and Vincennes as transit vehicles were destroyed.
And for 50 years the Chicago Transit Authority has said it has no money.
CTA failings could pack an eight-car train, said the Tribune on Feb. 10, 1997.
Ten years later, all remains the same. The CTA operates for its own convenience and comfort.
Political hacks in top management with generous salaries give unions whatever they ask for and run to Springfield for more money for extremely good pension programs and excellent health care.
Like the Toonerville Trolley, it operates for itself and nothing else. If it should, by chance, provide some poor soul with some semblance of transportation, so much the better.
Democratic Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daly wants the Olympics in the city in 2016. Our broken down transit system could not even begin to handle the event. Far better if the mayor got the light rail system in the central corridor built, with a proper extension.
Millions of dollars have been spent on engineering plans and the project sits in city hall. Federal and city funds were allocated.
Republican Gov. Jim Edgar, whose legacy was poor roads and under-funded schools, stopped state funding and the project was dead.
Edgar's only claim to fame, being a devout Baptist, was to kick booze out of the execu-tive mansion in Springfield.
The city's bus system must be privatized and the 'L' changed to "light rail."
The present ridership does not begin to require heavy rapid transit and never will. The CTA is a failure. The CTA should be replaced.
"The CTA should be dissolved," said Lerner Newspapers, January 1973.
"Put the CTA out of its misery," said the Chicago Tribune in December 2001.
Washington is a morass and Chicago is a quagmire. Let's change it now!
Get the Central Area Circulator built.
Robert H. Hanson
Algonquin