CTA presents doomsday scenario By Jon Hilkevitch Tribune transportation reporter
May 25, 2007
The CTA would eliminate 63 bus routes and two rail lines, and raise fares to as much as $3.25 a ride on trains if no new state funding is provided, CTA President Ron Huberman said today.
The CTA also would institute separate -- and higher -- fare structures for rush hours.
The combination of fare hikes and service cuts would begin in mid-September, and would result in a loss of 260,000 rides each weekday, according to the CTA's projection. CTA buses and trains now provide 1.6 million rides each day.
The CTA says it needs an extra $97.5 million in state money.
Under the plan, only bus routes that currently operate on Sundays would be retained. Those 91 routes would continue to operate at current levels.
Purple Line/Evanston Express service would be eliminated as would rail service on the Yellow Line, which runs between Dempster Street in Skokie and the Howard Red Line terminal, Huberman said.
The Purple Line would continue to operate between Howard Street and downtown Evanston to Wilmette.
The cuts would be needed to bridge a $97.5 million gap in the CTA's 2007 budget, Huberman said.
Also included in the contingency plan is the transfer of $56.9 million in capital improvement funds to operations and $5.6 million in new administrative cuts, he said. Those administrative cuts are in addition to the $12.5 million in cuts announced two weeks ago.
About 840 CTA employees would be laid off, he said.
Huberman said the agency's plan was not an attempt to pressure state lawmakers to come up with more funding.
"If we made no changes, the CTA would be out of service in October," he said, adding that the agency would be unable to meet payroll.
Among several options studied, the combination of service cuts and fare increases is "the least burdensome" on riders, he said.
Under some of those other options, _fares would increase as much as $7_ he said.
Fare increases would range from 25 cents to $1.25 per ride depending on the time of day and mode of travel, he said. Higher fares would be charged during rush periods, with $2.75 a ride on buses and $3.25 on trains.
The agency's goal would be to shift more riders to off-peak hours. Under the plan, the CTA would run 422 fewer buses and 68 fewer trains during peak travel times each day, Huberman said.
In non-peak periods, fares would go to $2.25 for buses and $2.50 for trains.
The current cash fare during peak and off-peak periods is $2 a ride. There are no transfers.
Prices for unlimited-ride passes would increase an average of 63 percent.
Cost of the 30-day pass, the agency's most popular, would increase from $75 to $122.
Copyright 2007, Chicago Tribune
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Isn't that incredible? Cut out two train routes and about half the busses, AND raise the fares to three or four dollars! This is just IMO since I do not plan to be back in that hell hole anytime soon, but the Transit Atrocity might insure that a working elevator be present at all stations, that fare collection agents be friendly, courteous and knowledgeable, and most important, that the agents/train personnel be HONEST about their fare collections. Oh, and it would help if all the outside stations had heaters where people had to stand for 20-30 minutes waiting for trains and busses. People write and wonder why I do not move back to Chicago to live. I could not begin to financially afford living there any longer. For what I pay to live in a full, complete house here, I would NOT be able to get anything close in Chicago, and I would be afraid of trying to get on a bus or train (as they now are constructed) with my motorized chair, let alone afford to pay the fare to ride. PAT]