Lessons from the Yellow Line

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Күн бұрын

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@AverytheCubanAmerican 4 күн бұрын

Yes, they absolutely lucked out when it comes to the Skokie Swift's right-of-way. As mentioned, it was a pre-existing rail line, the Niles Center Branch of the old Chicago Rapid Transit Company (CRT). So it was already used for a rapid transit line. The rapid transit service began as part of the Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee Railroad's high-speed Skokie Valley interurban line between Howard Terminal and Dempster Street, Niles Center (wasn't renamed Skokie until 1940 to avoid confusion with nearby Niles). It was placed in operation in March 1925. The route included several intermediate stops through Evanston and Skokie (then called Niles Center) at Ridge, Asbury, Dodge, Crawford/East Prairie, Kostner, Oakton and Main. In 1948, after purchasing the CRT in 1947, the CTA discontinued Niles Center Branch service and replaced it with a bus. When the Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee Railroad ceased operations in 1963, that's when CTA purchased the tracks on the line. As stated, when it re-opened in 1964, they wanted to present it as a revolutionary idea. It reopened as a federally-aided mass transit demonstration project. As shown, the original intermediate stations didn't reopen. However there was interest in Skokie to reopen one of the stations, with Oakton selected because of its downtown location. Thus, Oakton-Skokie reopened in 2012. On its first day of service in 1964, it carried nearly 4,000 passengers in a 16-hour period compared to approximately 1,600 passengers carried by the North Shore Line from the Dempster Terminal in a 12-hour period before the railroad terminated. Ridership continued to increase and by the end of the first year, nearly 6,000 passengers were riding the new line each weekday. Because of the weekday success, Saturday service was inaugurated, with more than 2,000 riders. At the end of the two-year experimental period, 3.5 million people had used the new service and CTA authorized operation of the Skokie Swift as a permanent part of its system. The Yellow Line used to operate by switching between third-rail and catenary, as in half of it was third-rail while the other-half was catenary left over from the Chicago North Shore and Milwaukee Railroad. It switched between these while in motion, just like New Haven Line trains do. This unique operation stopped in 2004 when third-rail replaced the catenary portion to increase reliability, reduce maintenance costs, and allow compatibility with other rapid-transit lines. The Purple Line used to operate like that as well. The Evanston shuttle as it was called before the Purple Line, once had overhead that originally extended all the way to Howard, but in 1963 the wire was replaced with third rail between South Blvd and Howard, so South Boulevard was where the trains switched between overhead and third-rail. The overhead between South Boulevard and Linden was converted to third-rail in 1973, which allowed the CTA to retire the Cincinnati Car Company-manufactured 4000-series cars

@Thomulate 3 күн бұрын

Thanks for sharing! I love this kind of detail. You clearly know your transit history. I had a previous version of this video with more details on the Skokie’s History, but I felt it was a little much and overshadowed my other points.

@SupremeLeaderKimJong-un 3 күн бұрын

The HBLR in NJ also had great luck with ROW usage. Much of the HBLR is repurposed ROW, though the downtown JC segment was built brand-new. The repurposed ROW selected goes through dense neighborhoods, like the Weehawken Tunnel formerly used by New York Central/West Shore Railroad trains (which went to Buffalo from Weehawken) with an underground stop at Bergenline Ave in Union City! The Bayonne portion uses the ROW of the former six-track CNJ main line (which also partly sits on former Morris Canal bed), the West Side Ave portion uses the CNJ's Newark and New York Railroad, and the section between western Hoboken and Port Imperial was once the NY Central's New Jersey Junction Railroad. It built its downtown JC section brand-new, still in its own right-of-way except for Essex Street where it's street-running. The NJ Junction Railroad and Weehawken Tunnel eventually became Conrail's River Line, which NJT bought the tracks from, and paid to upgrade the Northern Running Track as part of the deal so Conrail could shift its operations (now used by CSX). Yeah to be fair to the Waterfront Line, it definitely doesn't help that Cleveland has faced a population decline, it has been treated as an extension of the Blue and Green Lines which also have bad ridership due to awful single-family land use in Shaker Heights, the Waterfront Line was closed from 2021 to 2023 due to safety concerns for a bridge, and in 2024, it's only used on weekends, holidays, and for special events. The $70 million Waterfront Line was built in 1996 as a bicentennial legacy project to celebrate the city’s 200th birthday. It operated as an extension of the Shaker Heights-Tower City Center Blue and Green lines to improve access to a traffic-congested Flats East Bank District and serve attractions at the then-new North Coast Harbor at the foot of East 9th Street. Ridership actually exceeded projections of 600,000 boardings in its first year and held near 1 million riders per year in the late 1990s. But when fares were increased and the Flats East Bank started to fade at the turn of the century, use of the Waterfront Line fell. The line serves more than just the stadium, it serves the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Great Lakes Science Center, Amtrak, City Hall, Harbor Verandas apartments, Voinovich Bicentennial Park which hosts concerts, Steamship William G. Mather museum, USS Cod submarine memorial, Huntington Convention Center, Cleveland Public Auditorium, a US Coast Guard station, the Lakefront municipal lot (where South Harbor station is; the goal was to get people to park at the lot and take the Waterfront Line), and The Flats which has now experienced a revival with apartments, bars, a boardwalk, restaurants, etc. With the Browns moving to the suburbs, as well as the closure of Burke Lakefront Airport, this gives them an opportunity to further redevelop the lakefront. Under their North Coast masterplan, it includes a land bridge connecting City Hall and downtown with the lakefront, a natural wetland and raised or “perched” sand beach, parking lots redeveloped with housing, food, and retail like at South Harbor station, a central community plaza including an amphitheater, hotels, a multi-modal transit hub, added residential, retail and dining amenities, including a 16,000-square-foot food hall, and reassigning the Shoreway into a 35 mph boulevard with two lanes in each direction and a median. Thus, giving the people of downtown access to the waterfront, and to a waterfront all Clevelanders can enjoy.

@Thomulate 2 күн бұрын

This is true as well. I have seen many proposals to extend the West Side Avenue brand further to route 404. I recently tried to speedrun the HBLR, PATH, and Newark “subway” but service changes ruined the attempted- but it was very clear the ROWs allowed HBLR trains to reach super high speeds!

@Thomulate 2 күн бұрын

For your second point- I did look into Cleveland a little more, and what they are planning seems to be a great start! (Although it dosent really serve Amtrak since Lake Shore Limited trains arrive in the dead of night, when green/blue line service isn’t running)

@SupremeLeaderKimJong-un 2 күн бұрын

@@Thomulate Yes that's true about the Amtrak point for the time being, but you could say they're futureproofing, so when Cleveland gets better Amtrak service in the future, the hub will actually be a lot more useful

@ChuckE.CheesesIllinois 2 күн бұрын

Yes, very true supreme leader

@pacificostudios 4 күн бұрын

The Dan Ryan line was a new line into the South Side, but the Eisenhower Freeway (I-290) effectively destroyed an existing rail transit line, the Chicago Aurora & Elgin. It's rather odd to claim that replacing a line that served Elgin, Aurora, Batavia and Wheaton with an L Line that ends at Forest Park improved anything. Just had to point that out.

@Thomulate 4 күн бұрын

Hi- I had no clue I-290 was built that way- thank you so much for sharing.

@pacificostudios 4 күн бұрын

@@Thomulate - Your welcome. The Wikipedia article explains the story accurately.

@parkpark8715 4 күн бұрын

While I like this content, the quick editing and frequent sound affects makes this a bit difficult to watch

@Thomulate 4 күн бұрын

Thank you for the feedback.

@migueljoserivera9030 4 күн бұрын

First video of yours I've seen. Certainly will not be the last. I'm going to save a few more to watch later.

@Thomulate 4 күн бұрын

Thanks! more videos to come soon…

@ChicagolandTransit 2 күн бұрын

Excellent video!

@bahnspotterEU 3 күн бұрын

I feel like this video didn‘t really show what the Skokie Swift in particular did that made it apparently so good. I would‘ve liked some on the ground explanations, because these general four criteria for a successful transit line are found all over the world. And using old or otherwise used rights of way for rapid transit is also something you can learn to do by looking at other lines.

@Thomulate 3 күн бұрын

This is super true!