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Old 10-25-2019, 10:29 AM
 
Location: In the heights
36,975 posts, read 38,986,608 times
Reputation: 21010

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The electrified South Shore Line commuter rail service makes several stops within the city of Chicago along tracks it shares with Metra Electric. Along those stops, South Shore Line has an archaic policy that northbound trains within the city of Chicago are discharge-only while southbound trains within the city are boarding-only. These trains literally are stopping at these stations using the same tracks as Metra Electric, but are unusable to Chicagoans.

A similar policy was in effect in the NYC Tri-State area for Metro-North New Haven Line trains running shared tracks with Metro-North Harlem line trains for a long while, but earlier this year an agreement with the Connecticut Department of Transportation was reached to end that policy. This amounted to a massive increase in usability of the commuter rail line for city residents since it was effectively a doubling of frequencies at the affected stations which were in areas that were far from NYC rapid transit services. The South Shore Line policy is a very close parallel situation of a commuter rail service originating in another state having restrictive in-city boarding policies while stopping at stations another commuter rail line wholly within the state ran.

This is essentially a large boost in frequency without needing to buy more rolling stock, build more stations, or lay more track. These trains already exist and already stop at these stations on existing rail lines with existing rail service. The increase from this current schedule would mean service usable for city residents at Hegeswich, 57th Street Hyde Park, Museum Campus, Van Buren Street, and Millennium Station with what works out to essentially an additional 38 trips, 19 each way, a day with roughly half during rush and half at off-peak times.

So, is there any petition or something similar to try to change this rule? If so, what/where is it?
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Old 10-25-2019, 12:05 PM
 
Location: Hoosierville
17,059 posts, read 14,382,303 times
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Metra owns those tracks ... thus Metra makes the rules and the South Shore has a non compete agreement w/ Metra.
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Old 10-25-2019, 12:24 PM
 
Location: In the heights
36,975 posts, read 38,986,608 times
Reputation: 21010
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chuckity View Post
Metra owns those tracks ... thus Metra makes the rules and the South Shore has a non compete agreement w/ Metra.
I understand that which is how the Metro-North situation in New York City was as well. However, that non-compete was scrapped for what I believe was a degree of revenue-sharing and joint funding, because these are trains, stations, and rail already up and running not being used as efficiently as they could be. I guess since I focused on saying archaic policy of South Shore Line, it could be taken as I'm blaming NICTD for this--I'm not trying to do that. I'm saying that the policy itself is archaic and the parties involved should try to change it.
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Old 10-28-2019, 07:18 PM
 
12,999 posts, read 18,831,425 times
Reputation: 9236
Actually, there would be no competition, since Metra subsidizes operation within IL, including Hegewisch. Metra probably prefers to keep long distance passengers separate.
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Old 10-28-2019, 07:55 PM
 
Location: Bloomington IN
8,590 posts, read 12,266,537 times
Reputation: 24243
People can go either direction from the Hegewisch station. It's between 63rd and Millennium Station where travel is only allowed in one direction.
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