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LOCAL News :: Urban Development

CTA threatens huge cuts

CTA threatens huge cuts



March 10, 2005

BY MARK J. KONKOL Transportation Reporter

With no guarantee of more state transit cash, CTA officials are set to pick from a grim menu of scenarios that could increase train fares to as much as $3.40, or cut bus and rail service severely enough to put 3,500 employees out of work.

CTA staff Wednesday outlined five choices -- all of them bad news for riders -- to fill the agency's growing $55 million budget gap if state lawmakers don't find a new way to fund transit in the Chicago area.

The CTA board has until next month's meeting to pick its poison, a deadline that ensures enough time to mail out pink slips and implement either service cuts, fair increases or a combination of both.

DOOMSDAY CHOICES



Doomsday options on the table include cutting costs by eliminating bus routes, overnight L service and reducing frequency of buses and trains on all other routes.

An alternate service cut plan calls for retaining all routes but lengthening wait times between buses and trains, along with eliminating overnight L service and Purple Line express trains during rush hour.

Layoffs would require giving affected employees 60 days notice before doomsday, which is set for July 4.

Bus fares could hit $2.15

Rather than cut service, the CTA board also could choose to increase fares a variety of ways, including one plan that would spike train fares to $3.40 and bus fares to $2.15. Fare increases, if selected as an alternative, are slated for July 1.

CTA staff also pitched a plan to limit service cuts by coupling them with at least a 25-cent fare increase. In all, about 30 bus routes and overnight L service would be slashed.

The final scenario calls for freezing fares while scaling back all CTA service to current Sunday schedules, with fewer routes, less frequent trips and no overnight L service.

CTA board chairwoman Carole Brown said the options were unveiled publicly to "frame the public debate so that this board can be guided by the input of our customers and community leaders as we wrestle with this most difficult decision.

In the hands of lawmakers



"I'm hopeful that this is a little like buying insurance. No one wants to use the plan, but it would be irresponsible not to have one," Brown said.

"Each option is bad, very bad."

The bad news options differ on whom each would affect, officials said. CTA staff are reviewing each plan to make sure it would not unfairly affect poor, minority neighborhoods.

Whether the CTA will be forced to implement a doomsday plan remains in the hands of state lawmakers. CTA leaders want lawmakers to change the way transit is funded in the Chicago area, a move opposed by Metra officials.

Gov. Blagojevich has pitched a CTA bailout that would be linked to ending a $65 million tax break given to businesses on computer software purchases.

The idea was rejected by lawmakers last fall, and CTA President Frank Kruesi says it wouldn't be enough to fix "structural" funding problems that have eroded CTA revenues.
 
 

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