Evanston may lose all but one CTA bus route, evening and weekend service on all Pace bus routes, and some Union Pacific North Metra Line service if the state doesn’t come through with the funding to keep Chicago-area transit agencies from going off the fiscal cliff.
Those are the major takeaways from the presentations the three agencies gave to the Regional Transportation Authority Board of Directors on March 27. RTA, which has the final say over the groups’ budgets, previewed the doomsday plans in a March 21 press release.
The presentation March 27 shared some details on how the cuts might affect Chicago and the suburbs. The plans are not final and would need to go through the Title VI analysis to make sure the cuts would not disproportionately impact any communities. And all transit officials hope that Illinois General Assembly will come through with funding to make the discussion irrelevant.
The three agencies also presented what they would do the state pitches in $1.5 billion for Chicago transit. Notably, Metra would make several lines, including Union Pacific North, run once every half an hour every day of the week. CTA would increase headways to eight minutes on 47 of its busier routes, and to every 15 minutes in the rest of the system.
Approaching the fiscal cliff
Chicago-area transit providers have been using federal stimulus funds to shore up their budgets as fare revenue continues to lag behind pre-pandemic levels.
The major driver of the ticket sales were 9-to-5 workplace commuters, which the pandemic disrupted.
Meanwhile, the weekend ridership has recovered, and in some cases even increased compared to pre-pandemic levels. The Union Pacific North line, which serves Evanston, is a prominent example of that.
The stimulus funding is expected to run out in 2026. RTA estimates that the three agencies would then face a combined $770 million budget shortfall, which would require each of them to cut 40% from their respective budgets.
RTA, CTA, Metra and Pace identified $113.2 million in “efficiencies,” a number that includes $50 million they expect to generate from raising fares by 10%.
A 10% fare increase would mean L fare would increase from $2.50 to $2.75, CTA bus fare from $2.25 to $2.48, and Pace bus fares from $2 to $2.20. Metra fares vary depending on the distance from downtown Chicago, but a fare from the Loop to Evanston would rise from $3.75 to $4.13.
Since transit agencies are legally required to submit their budgets for RTA review in November, work on the service cuts would have to begin this summer, after General Assembly’s current session ends.
The scope of the cuts
In the memo to the RTA, CTA warned that it “could need to eliminate service on all or a portion of four of its eight rail lines and close or severely diminish service to over 50 rail stations.”
Nora Leerhsen, the agency’s acting president, didn’t go into more detail in her presentation, but she shared a map that showed which of the 74 routes mentioned in the RTA press release could get the ax.
The potential cuts include Route 93 California/Dodge, which mostly serves the Dodge Avenue corridor in Evanston; Route 201 Central/Ridge, which serves most of the Evanston portion of Central Streets and parts of Sheridan Road and Ridge Avenue; and rush-hour-only Route 206/Evanston Circulator, as the routes cut. Route 97/Skokie, which serves Howard Street, would remain.
The Metra presentation by Janice Thomas, the agency’s chief of staff, did not reveal any new details about the impact of the potential cuts on Union Pacific North Line beyond what was in Friday’s press release. The weekday headways would be cut from between 30-60 minutes midday and once every hour in the early morning and the evening to once an hour across the board. Metra spokesperson Michael Gillis told the RoundTable that there will be some rush hour express trains, but that Metra was still working out those details.
All Pace routes would lose weekend service and evening service after 8 p.m. This would mostly impact Routes 208, 215 and 250, which operate seven days a week. Route 213 operates Monday through Saturday, so the impact would be smaller.
Pace Executive Director Melinda Metzger told the RoundTable that Pulse Dempster service — an express service that follows the same routing as Route 250 and has been operating as frequently as once every 15 minutes most of the day — could see its headways reduced to once an hour. The change would put it behind Route 250’s schedule from before Pulse service was introduced, when it operated an average of 20-30 minutes most of the day.
Route 213 provides special “school day service” to Evanston Township High School, detouring from its usual route to pick up and drop off students before and after school. This is an arrangement Pace has with several high schools throughout the Chciago area that don’t have school buses. Metzger said that the service would be reduced as well, but Pace did not provide specifics.
In her presentation to the RTA board, Metzger also warned about the impact of transit cuts on paratransit service, which Pace provides for both Chicago and the suburbs. Under federal law, it is required to provide the service within three-fourths of a mile of any fixed bus route or a rail station. This not only means that any bus route cuts would reduce service, but it also means that, on weekends, it would be essentially limited to within three-fourths of a mile of the Purple Line L stations.
Doomsday funding scenario could decimate public-transit access in Evanston is from Evanston RoundTable, Evanston's most trusted source for unbiased, in-depth journalism.