Clik here to view.
The CTA had to replace the entire ceiling at the Davis L station ground level — all because multiple raccoons somehow got in and damaged it earlier this year.
This was revealed during the construction update presented at the Chicago Transit Board’s Dec. 11 meeting. Bill Mooney, the agency’s chief infrastructure officer, usually gives the update at the end of each board meeting. The updates touch on major projects such as the Red and Purple Modernization (RPM) project, and smaller-scale and more behind-the-scenes improvements.
Mooney mentioned the raccoon issue while updating the transit board on Refresh and Renew, the ongoing work to clean, repaint, update lighting and do some minor improvements. This year’s work included Evanston’s Davis station.
“Davis Purple [station] was interesting,” Mooney said. “So, we actually had a raccoon problem. A series of raccoons kept breaking into the ceiling and causing damage to the ceiling tiles.”
He said that CTA “ended up having to completely remove the ceiling, find out where the intrusion was” and seal off the opening raccoons used to gain access. The transit agency then completely redid the ceiling, not only replacing the tiles but putting in a new grid to hold them.
In a brief interview after the meeting, Mooney told the RoundTable that, while he couldn’t recall the exact dates, the incident happened sometime in the spring. While it took “a few weeks” to find and seal the opening, it took “a few months” to fully replace the ceiling.
Clik here to view.
Mooney told the board that ceiling replacement ended up being “a nice component as part of the general refresh of the station.”
Other station refreshments included general cleaning and replacement; and putting in LED lights.
The current Davis station opened 30 years ago in 1994. It is one of only three ADA-compliant stations on the Purple Line, and the only ADA-compliant station within Evanston city limits.
The final phase of the RPM project would include the non-express portion of the Purple Line, and would require CTA to make all stations ADA-compliant. While the Davis station is relatively new, CTA officials previously suggested potential platform configuration changes at the even newer Howard station.
The next phases are still in planning stages and the construction update didn’t mention any new development in that regard. While CTA set the goal of making all stations ADA-accessible by 2038, no deadline has been set for when construction might begin, let alone be completed.
CTA says it redid Davis L station ceiling due to raccoon damage is from Evanston RoundTable, Evanston's most trusted source for unbiased, in-depth journalism.
