Nik Hunder
@NikHunder
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Professional drawer of lines. Energy guy when I want to be. @CTA 's worst messenger @CHIRPRadio DJ. Alt for mutuals: @municipalfunds
Chicago, IL
Joined September 2015
Don't wanna be here?
Send us removal request.
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If you're ever late to work because the train was delayed, you can ask the customer service assistant for a delay slip to get yourself off the hook
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I wish we didn't throw out the instructions on how to build another one of these
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Inspired by the New Yorkers, I've set up a DIY CTA stickering campaign. MBJ and DRC deserve all the flack for wasting Chicagoan's time and risking our economic stability.
Paste these wherever you please and share them around.
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Woah
@CTA
W. I used the chat bot to report smoking and within a stop, there was an announcement and the operator came back to check the car (the offender stopped after the announcement)
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CTA is getting a new control center/training facility in Garfield Park. It will have 120-150 jobs with 188 planned parking spots!
It's steps away from the Pulaski (Green) stop and has more parking than jobs. How was this allowed? You are a transit agency
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Nice one guys
We're testing out a new feature in hopes of getting real time feedback from riders.
If you see one of these stickers on your bus or train, scan it and let us know how it went. 📱
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I just attended
@cta
's flagger orientation to help educate myself and it made me realize why they experience a high attrition rate for that position
CTA's Rail Ops Manager for Red, Yellow, and Purple and the manager for Blue and Pink we're both there to answer questions 🧵
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In the first three months of 2024, CTA only managed to transition two flaggers to rail operators. In that same time period, they lost 19 and hired 92. CTA went from September '23 to January '24 without beginning a rail training class. No wonder rail schedules have not recovered.
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Get served
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The consensus is in. After years of hard work by advocates, It's time to say goodbye to Dorval Carter.
Here is every article published about CTA this week (none of them are positive)
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You're going to run a train so I can get to work right? Right?!
There are two trains on the entire brown line. That's a ~27-minute northbound headway and an ∞ southbound headway. They haven't sent off a train from Kimball in 39 minutes
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Today in silly FOIA shenanigans, CTA is making the argument that they do not keep "logs" and only "records" so that they do not have to provide certain records to me. Never heard what a synonym is
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Lots of items delivered to the north side come from here. Don't cross their line by ordering something
HAPPENING NOW: Amazon drivers at DIL7 in Skokie, IL are on strike against unfair labor practices! It’s time Amazon delivers the good jobs that all Amazon workers deserve. Follow along for updates from the picket line 💪
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Listening to the CTA board meeting this morning. I have one recurring thought: Why does CTA insist that all of their problems are also the fault of everyone else? It is never, "we're going to fix it" it is "we can't fix it unless everyone else does their part first."
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Perfect encapsulation of the battle CTA is losing and the customer base it may never recover. I must arrive on time to work and currently the train/bus always leaves an unhealthy amount of uncertainty
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Rail Ops for RPY said "if your support system isn't strong, now is a great time to start increasing it... prepare your families for it"
That is inconsiderate and also unrealistic. How can anyone plan on working 12am-8am one day 3pm-11pm another and 8pm to 4am on a third day?
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Let's just be happy that we opened a new station today. Today, I don't care how much it costs, whether the bridge is necessary, or if it's made mostly of glass. I'm just glad we are willing to invest money into the system to make something like this happen.
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I looked at CTA delays over the past 4 months to see what was slowing down the system. There is a lot of police activity, mechanical and door issues, or sick or injured passengers. But each line exhibits a different makeup of issues
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The next CTA station may well be the Racine Green Line station which was closed in 1994. CTA has an RFP out for design and preliminary engineering.
-Restored—not reconstructed, it's on the NRHP
-Area transit plan for bike and bus connections
-Three alternatives
-100% SBE/10% EDA
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I'll be representing myself (pro se) to enforce Illinois' FOIA statute against CTA's willful neglect of my requests. This is my first suit but the 21st and 22nd time CTA has failed to answer a request of mine on time.
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New from Me: Chicago plans to spend billions to redo NDLSD. Parkland is expanding, but so is the highway. $1.3 billion of the cost is for a shoreline restoration project but only allows for the width of the highway to increase. It's a highway expansion.
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New from Me and Christina Marfice: We dug up CTA's flagger data to see if they really could train 200 operators in 2024. It's not mathematically possible even if they tried their hardest
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A potential applicant asked if "there was any additional training for rail Operators?" which is valid because it's not advertised... and then the RPY manager just laughed before answering the question.
What is going on over there? Why would you laugh?!
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The Q&A and meeting got cut off after 35 minutes and about 5 questions were answered because I guess the rail managers had something more important to do than help recruit people to help improve service.
I'm not following their math
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🚨 Tomorrow the 27th is a big day for transit activists and anyone who rides the CTA. Pres. Dorval Carter and leadership will be testifying in a new legally required quarterly hearing. I will be providing live-tweet coverage starting at 9:30 am.
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CTA train operator tenure is remarkably low as of today. 53% of ops have been with CTA for < 4 years. This data visualizes how poor internal culture (well known to be poor) is causing high turnover rates and the effect of pandemic-related retirements.
n=453 (n=239, 2021-24) 🧵
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Good but frustrating to see that CTA is putting flaggers it hired this March in training to become Rail Operators which means they could have been doing this years ago but just didn't until they got called on it publically
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What if you had children? $21/hr wouldn't cover the cost and you'd need to find it last minute. It is that or all family duties are shifted to one person at random for 6-12 months of someone's life
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Dorval Carter is legally required to meet with the City Council Transportation committee, but instead, he keeps rescheduling and has become unprofessionally hostile towards activists. Read our open letter and email the Transportation Cmte. demanding they enforce
this resolution
At the Chicago Transit Board’s Jan. 18 meeting,
@cta
President Dorval Carter berated 2 of our members for an op-ed they wrote in an attempt to hold him — and other CTA leadership — accountable. Read the op-ed here:
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Average time spent as a flagger before becoming an RTO 6/1-12/31/23: 439 days.
In January, I co-authored an Op-Ed and it irked the CTA. They called me out in a board meeting, wrote a L-to-E, and made a press release. Told we were wrong, I found my proof.
New from Me and Christina Marfice: We dug up CTA's flagger data to see if they really could train 200 operators in 2024. It's not mathematically possible even if they tried their hardest
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Well, it's 4:07 and I have indeed made it to Polk. That completes today's speed run with doors open at every station. It took 9 hours 33 minutes and 19 seconds. I wanted 9h30m and this is close enough. Calling this a W. Thoughts and observations later after I get some grub.
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It has gotten so bad for Dorval that he denied everything we said and three board members still suggested that CTA should be more transparent.
He offered no correction and said it's on activists to converse with the CTA. We've been trying but keep getting stonewalled
Rallying against Christina and I's ope-ed. Calls Christina and I are liars. Says people don't always wait. Says we don't understand the necessary context. Well, maybe if you were transparent, people would cut you some slack. Garbage of response
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CTA was insistent that it could confidently run 100% of this service reduction and on day one, we still got 90%. No matter what the schedule says, the best we can do is 90%.
How much service needs to be cut before we get to 100%?
Hourly breakdowns by line are in the next tweets
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If Dorval Carter gets fired,
@ctaaction
should charter a train around the city to celebrate
Did you know you can charter a CTA train and throw a party on board?!? I have a new life goal.
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They emphasized that a strong support system was needed to excel in this role because CTA's needs fluctuate with construction needs. That has created a system where employees find out the day ahead by "calling" (needs context) to find out which 8 hrs (12 in OT) they'll be working
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Wow.
@CTA
just got an extra $400 million in federal funding for the first year of the Red Line extension which will help expedite the release of more federal funds across the project lifecycle.
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Now that the Skokie Swift is back in action, it is time for a
@cta
speedrun attempt. Follow me along throughout your day starting at 6:35am at Linden as I attempt to not set a record, but at least get under 9h 30m for a Class A attempt (doors open at every station)
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It's time for a CTA fare increase. Mostly in long-term passes to increase the average fare which sits at $1.07. Fares have gone up just 50¢ since 2009. Service is recovering, but still poor. However, long-term financial health needs to be managed.
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If you're annoyed. Go be like other ghosties and sign
@ctaaction
's letter to make sure Dorval Carter shows up to City Council in February
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@cornoisseur
Going to put my forklift certification to use and start moving boulders into intersections
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Yeah I noticed you bought a car
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Did it delay us by three minutes? Yes. Did it work? Also yes. I'd prefer stopping the smoking over arriving a little bit sooner
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CTA just updated their GTFS (schedule) package which takes effect 11/3. This has been advertised as a 2019 service restoration and on paper, it's close.
Details are below, data creds go to
@FabioG_CZ
and
@bsmcfadden
for making it intelligible for me.
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This is great momentum to have. It forces Johnson to do his research to pick someone qualified so he doesn't get embarrassed again.
Maybe it's a good thing we don't have the guy using "former rapper" as an insult as our representative to the RTA
Rev. Acree pulled no punches on his way out of a 25k/year appointment to an influential transit board.
He called questions about CTA President's future “political puppeteering” and slammed Ald. Vasquez, saying his “previous job was a local rapper.”
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It's the middle of the month which means it's time for a
@CTA
board meeting. At 10am, come back here for updates from the love of my life's board meeting.
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Only 15NB/17SB Red Line trains between 11pm and 3am and at 1am they told everyone to "find alternate modes."
Not sure how we are supposed to teach younger people (whose minds are malleable) the value of public transit if we fail them on (maybe) one of their first experiences
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I'm haunted by the quote thrown out at the public hearing for the budget last week "The entire city is coming to a halt because the CTA can't hire 100 workers"
Carter is drawing a comparison to airlines where he says "you now have less options with airlines because they have less pilots"
I don't agree. This is a system that moves people around a city, meant to increase GDP, to make this city livable. They serve different functions.
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Last week
@CTA
announced an official schedule change. Delivered service went down by nearly the entire increase in service they said they had been reliably providing for weeks prior ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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I'll never bet against Metra. Ravenswood to Woodlawn in 45 minutes (bike assist downtown). I was able to leave a full hour later than if I tried to take CTA
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Jakes speaking to Carter: Told Carter to talk to
@ctaaction
DC says it was on us to talk to him about the data. Thanks. I had to FOIA to even get it. I don't see how this is on us because Carter hates when we engage with the CTA. Jakes at least believes there's some truth to it
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"As soon as our 24/7 Operations Control Center was notified... responders were on scene within a couple of minutes"
"The initial 911 call was made at a nearby BP gas station and not from CTAs control center"
Someone died on their watch and they can't even be truthful about it
1 hour.
That's how long a CTA employee sat in the driver seat of their bus before being found unconscious. They later died. I looked into what happened that night and how a stalled bus, that missed over 50 scheduled stops, never raised any red flags.
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New CTA Board Appointment, Roberto Requejo from Elevated Chicago. He's got my support. Here is someone who understands what equity means and why we need it systemwide. Also, if you can run a non-profit successfully, that's a leg up on most Exec. Directors
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Imagine performing so poorly as a bureaucrat that you get five paragraphs ripping your performance. New from
@BlockClubCHI
@_ManuelRamos_
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So we're going to build a Pink Line infill station on Adams right?
The owners behind the United Center announced on Tuesday that the parking lots and area surrounding the United Center will be replaced by a $7 billion mixed-use district — a price tag they say would make it the largest private investment in the West Side.
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Happy to hear
@Metra
has it in their System Network Plan to start planning for through-routing to get from one side of the city to another
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Hats off to CTA for just this month putting out an RFP for bus lane enforcement cameras that close in mid-September. So much for even trying to start this in June (after an 18-month window).
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Can't wait to offset the emissions I reduced by taking my bike so that Strava can spend it on useless AI
Meet Athlete Intelligence – personalized AI insights to reach your goals.🧠 It analyzes your activities to give you instant feedback, celebrates your wins, and keeps you motivated. Starting today, AI is coming to all subscribers over the coming weeks. 👇
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Rallying against Christina and I's ope-ed. Calls Christina and I are liars. Says people don't always wait. Says we don't understand the necessary context. Well, maybe if you were transparent, people would cut you some slack. Garbage of response
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Who has FOIA tips for getting city security camera footage? Someone hit me (I'm fine) but didn't stop up in Rodgers Park
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"CTA is “moving in the right direction” under DRC but argued it is “not unheard of” for Carter to be targeted because he is African-American."
City Council said it was bad job performance, not race. Are we really going to keep playing this card? The stats speak for themselves
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This is what happens when most of your C-Suite drives to work. You get decisions that don't reflect your core mission
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It doesn't matter who you are, it's always "you don't have accurate information" and then it will never be provided to you. It's also your fault for not knowing better. No matter if you're a rider or an alderperson, they're going to stick it to you.
20 aldermen have now signed onto the resolution. CTA has put out a statement pushing back hard on this:
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Can you help me verify these businesses are still operating at any of these stations? These are businesses CTA thinks are operating in its train stations, but some like the Dunkin at Grand (Red) no longer operate there.
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Bad news, CTA only got 56 train operators (CSO+RTO) into service in the last six months of 2023
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My one ongoing beef with Metra is that it's never clear on the MD-N which side the train is showing up on. I know it's Platform 1 outbound here but it always leaves me second guessing
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Alder justifications for blocking this:
"...Done nothing immoral, unethical or illegal"
"I dare my colleague to take that resolution to that man’s wife and children"
"But I'm just not in the business of taking food off people’s table"
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WTTW: "About two dozen comments leaned positive (of 308 comments)"
Pro-redesign commenter: "Please do not indulge the small, vocal minority"
Who is the minority now?
"How many Chicagoans need to tell you they don't want a highway before you bring any amount of bold vision to your plans?" We got the (overwhelmingly critical) public comments IDOT and CDOT received on their Lake Shore Drive redesign plan. Take a look:
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CTA is creating a long-term strategic plan and they want your opinion.
I found that there were a lot of shorter-term goals (in the long-term survey) that shouldn't require a long-term plan but there's a box at the end for you to pitch them some ideas.
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Not only were trains added, but they were added at useful times and are useful lengths. Maybe this merger will be good after all, if the Metra ops team's protocols are applied to CTA ops
Metra’s newest station at Peterson/Ridge in Chicago’s Edgewater neighborhood is set to open to the public on Monday, May 20. On the same day, Metra will add four trains to weekday service on the UP North Line. View the news release here:
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@itskylelucas
is up: Direct talking to DRC. Tells him he knows Carter is tired. But commuters are also tired. They're both making eye contact. Says activists are here because they want the system to succeed. Reiterating that we all want this system to succeed
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Chris Gentry is speaking now: Sold his car within 6 months of moving here bc of CTA but it is not the same as 4 years ago. Watching his friends buy cars again bc of unreliability. Had a friend lose their job bc of bad service. His company provides rideshare reimbursement now
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Minor note from the Cmte on Ped meeting. CTA is moving forward with installing more of these braille signs. A public commenter/advocate for the blind says the signs only read "Bus Stop" and don't provide information like the intersection or bus line. Public feedback had no effect
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Pretty agitating to read that CTA is still procuring the cameras when I've been told they wanted this to start 27 days ago. They're already unhappy they are not receiving ticket revenue so I hope this fumbled start by them and CDOT doesn't put the future of this in jeopardy
The city plans to try ticketing drivers parked in bike and bus lanes using cameras on CTA buses and city poles, an attempt to improve bus service and safety for cyclists and pedestrians.
The test run was going to start this summer. But it's been delayed.
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I don't think this is a sign you're going to put on the best face possible
Starting this weekend, riders are strongly encouraged to allow extra travel time and to check on the latest service impacts due to the DNC prior to any trip. 🧵
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@mollyfleck
I feel as if in the last year, there are just less and less things in stores. I want to get less delivery trucks on the road but everything has to be ordered online
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Thursday, May 30th at 10am is the Q2 CTA-Committee on Transportation meeting where CTA President Dorval Carter will be answering questions from committee members.
I'll be live tweeting updates from the City Council chamber during the meeting in this thread
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Thankful for Illinois FOIA law becuase I asked the MTA for the contact between them and their automatic camera bus enforcement technology supplier and they said "You're going to have to specify the contractor's name"
Thanks, that is what I was trying to learn.
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Perfect summary of IDOT priorities. They needed an on-ramp so the pedestrian path got narrowed into almost nothing
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At the very beginning of this project fwiw. I thought this was just a repave of DLSD but it is actually ~15' wider in most parts compared to what is there now
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If government officials are making tiktok-stlye videos on their social media about a problem the city is facing, someone is majorly in the wrong
Next week I’m introducing a resolution with Ald. Vasquez calling for new CTA leadership.
Chicagoans deserve frequent, safe, and reliable transportation, as well as leaders who will help make that a reality.
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It's RAIL OPERATIONS staff, not RAIL OPERATORS. 79 of 88 employees who started training have completed training. There were 80 IN training on Monday. Only 23 began this week. Soon it will drop to 58 after training concludes.
79 staff trained but net op staff only went up 15 YTD
Now arriving: more train service!
📈 9% more scheduled service added since April 2024
🚆 79 employees have successfully completed rail operator training this year
🏫 More than 80 employees begin training this Monday
More:
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I've created the Chicago Transit Authority FOIA document repository so that everyone has access to CTA info.
You can find it here:
Not all documents have been provided due to legal sensitivity and the right of the requester to review the materials first
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"Every transit agency’s recovery is influenced by... service reliability, service levels... In NYC, residents are much more likely to be reliant on public transit than owning a car" Kilgannon wrote.
I wonder who could have made Chicago reliant on cars?
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Based on CTA's upcoming November pick list, I calculated what expected service levels are likely to look like. Carter has been insistent that CTA will return to 2019 levels this fall, it's gonna be short of that. It'll be a 12.5% cut versus the current 15.6% cut. Details below.
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We did indeed go the entire meeting without discussing service cuts or the death of a bus operator
I'll be providing light live-tweet coverage of tomorrow's CTA Transit Board meeting. It is slated to begin at 10am tomorrow. The agenda is below.
I'll be looking out for 1) if we start on time 2) we talk about the recent service cuts and 3) if we talk about Antia Lyons' death
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If you have ever wondered why CTA can't staff itself, here is another reason. CTA treats its second-chance employees like second-class citizens. It's as if being given a second chance is being used against them
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The vibes that I got from the meeting today really just point to a bad pattern the CTA has.
Were critiquing him because he's obscured facts and we're un-satisfied. So he rebuffs it. But in doing so, he doesn't provide all the details so we continue to get at him. 1/3
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Slides from the Ravenswood Greenway Community Meeting.
I saw a lot of bikers and not a lot of opposition. Begone excess parking
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Reminder there is a CTA board meeting today. Random thoughts in this thread starting at 10am (maybe, that doesn't mean anything anymore).
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