8/28/2023 0 Comments Howard red lineIn another instance, he saw a woman kick a man in the neck. A man behind her grabbed it out of her hand. I’ve been shoved, I’ve been pushed.”Īnother Red Line rider, Sean Macleish, said he was on the way home from work when a woman selling alcohol on the train pulled out a meat cleaver and said she was going to cut him. I’ve had someone try to get into my backpack while I’m holding on to it. “As a woman I do not feel safe taking the train or the bus at times,” said Joy Miles, who takes the Red Line from Edgewater to East Lake View. Slightly under half of riders (45%) who took our survey said they felt “somewhat unsafe” or “very unsafe” riding a bus or train, while a similar percentage (47%) said they felt “fairly safe.” Seven percent of respondents said they felt “very safe” riding a bus or train in the past 30 days. Macleish, an immigrant from the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent, said he’s been mugged multiple times since moving to the city decades ago. Sean Macleish takes the Red Line every day for his job as a cytotechnologist. Riders who depend on multiple modes of transit were annoyed with bus-to-train schedules that didn’t line up, causing them to exit one mode of transportation but miss a transfer, prolonging their commute.Ī wave of violent incidents on the Red Line in 2022 rattled riders, and some said they no longer felt safe taking public transportation outside of the more populated commute times in the mornings and evenings. Or a bus full of people waiting on a driver that then gets passed by another bus on the route - it ends up being frustrating for riders.”īus delays, followed by two or three showing up in a row, a phenomenon dubbed “bus bunching.” “When you have the Clark bus blocking traffic at Foster and Clark because of the narrow road and no driver change over - that gets awkward. “The relief driver isn’t there, and the original driver just leaves,” said Natasha Leyk, who mostly commutes via the 147 bus. Survey takers described multiple situations when crowded buses drove past riders without stopping.ĭriver shift changes mid-route left riders stranded on a bus after drivers abruptly stopped the bus and left. Some also said the agency needs to deploy longer buses for popular routes, such as the Jackson Park Express bus (#6). Riders said there don’t appear to be as many buses as pre-pandemic, so when the bus does arrive, it is more crowded. Respondents had several other specific complaints about bus service: I wait for either the 2 or 6 at State and Lake and very often see eight to 10 146 and 148 buses come by, mostly empty, before a 2 or 6 finally arrives. “Of course the bus tracker has no relation to reality whatsoever. I have been late for work so often and it is impossible to plan on being on time,” said Elise Auerbach. “I have waited well over an hour for buses that don’t show up. Riders also asked when promised technology upgrades to address the problem - part of the agency’s Meeting the Moment CTA improvement plan - would be deployed. Michael Gerstein for WBEZĪ poorly functioning tracker system came up often in responses. He recounted a time he watched as a man was robbed on a Blue Line platform on the city’s West Side. Rider Raunel Urquiza takes the Blue Line daily to his job downtown. One manager said his employees were consistently late to work at their hourly job, impacting business. Elderly riders described missed appointments when buses and trains were delayed to the University of Illinois at Chicago medical campus. One student said she’d been late for school 13 times due to delays on the 82 Kimball-Homan bus. Nearly nine in 10 survey takers - 89% - said they experienced a service delay in the past 30 days. Long waits, ghost buses, unreliable tracking Repeated requests to interview President Dorval Carter were denied, but CTA Vice President Brian Steele participated in a wide-ranging interview that covers readers’ questions on everything from inaccurate trackers to safety improvements. WBEZ encouraged riders to submit questions for the agency. Please include your name and contact information. Have a CTA story to share? We want to hear it. Many also extolled the virtues of a strong public transit system as part of the city’s DNA despite their frustrations and wanted more transparency and accountability from agency officials. The majority of riders vented about delays, ghost buses and safety, although gratitude and empathy for CTA workers threaded throughout. In the WBEZ survey, several riders expressed safety concerns and said that they no longer feel safe using public transit after dark. Riders wait at a Loop El stop platform at night in December 2022.
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