After the June 1 effective date of the transit bill, RTA is quick to flex its new powers over the Service Boards. RTA chair Dillard sent a letter to the service board chairs last week basically telling them they have to follow RTA directions now. Here is the full letter (courtesy of FOIA):

A THREAD: The vital importance of key arterial road segments in Chicago

New Dangerous By Design report @smartgrowthusa.bsky.social. Pedestrian fatality trend has worsened in the Chicago region and in Illinois as a whole.

Many suburbs also look at their Metra station downtowns as something that can't be replicated nearby without destroying their existing amenity, which is such a zero-sum mindset. The demand is latent, you just need to make it available with more housing and people-scale retail!

People yearn for walkable communities throughout the region, not just in the city proper

The regular "well that sucks, you need to wait four or more weeks" nature that infrastructure management in the US takes towards bicycle and pedestrian projects and flooding (looking at you, Des Plaines River Trail) really helps one understand why modal uptake is so low.

When a thousand people a day have to avoid a blocked tunnel thats fine. When lakeshore drive is blocked its treated as an emergency

The Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning is putting together its Century Plan, a long term vision for the region, addition to its next Regional Transportation Plan. On 6/23 CMAP is hosting a "future-focused transportation conversation." Public invited. content.govdelivery.com/accounts/ILC...

Cities are the Real America and the city dweller must take the country back from the tyrannical, Hitler-loving suburbanite.

Holy shit they’re doing the wall

WE'RE SO FUCKING GOOD AT THIS. WE DONT NEED TO HIRE OPERATORS DIRECTLY, KEEP THE FLAGGER REQUIREMENT IN PLACE

normalize calling your city council member to tell them your rent went up and complain about the lack of housing production

NITA Board appointments news. The effectiveness of the NITA Act reforms depends heavily on whether transit board directors embrace those reforms, recruit strong executive leaders, hold them accountable, and serve as effective advocates for transit in Springfield, DC, city halls, and w/stakeholders.

That’s nice but it’s no 24/7 red line service Seriously though that’s great maybe it should just be permanent

TICK TOCK

If you use Waymo driverless car services, you are aiding and abetting fascism. Waymo helps I.C.E. agents locate people to terrorize and abduct. The company willingly shares all facial recognition, license plate and GPS data with I.C.E. and other law enforcement agencies—no subpoena required.

We don’t talk about this map enough. If you live in an area that’s red, you should 1) call/email your alderman 2) tell them that you’re concerned about housing costs 3) ask them lift the ban on multifamily buildings in your neighborhood by rezoning to minimum of RT-4. @stevevance.net

Hahahahaha HAHAHAHAHA

Me walking everywhere

Transportation funding is under assault at every level. Contact your representatives at every level of government.

The bipartisan US House transport bill—which passed through committee—would: —Eliminate all guaranteed funding for new transit projects, forcing transit to fight for appropriations —Reduce *potential* transit funds by 15% & *potential* rail funds by 44% —Increase highway’s share of federal funds

If it gets its way, the US House would drastically reduce funding for transit & rail systems. The House's proposed legislation—supported by GOP & Dems—would cut overall authorized transit funding by 15% compared to the current law, and reduce potential funding for projects like new lines by 45%.

It'll be solved by June cuz it'll be bad if it isn't

Motion is called to a vote. 4 no votes, will be reported to council. No votes: Scott, Quinn, Dowell, Moore

The Chicago Committee on Housing & Real Estate is now in session. This 🧵 will cover up to the discussion everyone is talking about, the city’s plan to purchase the downtown bus terminal. www.chicityclerk.com/committee-ho...

Really glad Chicago sold their parking meters so we can’t have this

I have heard "They're never happy" from more than one city engineer regarding bicycle infrastructure projects and the advocacy community and it's just aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh.

Since the NITA became law on June 1st, Collar counties are starting to address their new NITA board appointments. McHenry, Lake, and Kane Counties are all close to finalizing their appointments (cc @starlinechicago.bsky.social, @stevevance.net):

Looks like they gave up on blue already.

People will continue to be hit by cars and die because Chicago's government has decided that cyclists and pedestrians dying is preferable to having to listen to drivers whine about how they feel inconvenienced

Last summer Armitage was doing 80-90% of peak weekday service on Saturdays. Since purple doesn't run downtown on weekends, it was already seeing more riders per car than weekdays! Its not 2019 anymore. Cutting brown line weekend service in half makes no sense.

You better believe if the city had figured out how to give the bears a bunch of money for a new stadium, Susan Mendoza would be on the other side of this issue

Remember, according to the @chicagotribune.com Editorial Board, the onus is on bike advocates to find more “common ground” with the drivers that kill them instead of making streets safer for all. They literally said that like three weeks ago.

The CTA is already running 8 car trains on blue per reports. Brown is super busy and seems crush loaded. @chicagocta.bsky.social what are we doing

Chicago’s “mini mayor” system needs to end. Alders should not have the power to block critical street safety infrastructure in their wards.

Tweet is really good too. Like surprisingly good food.

This is broadly ahistorical, a second front was a priority for every Allied power, including the USSR. Stalin repeatedly asked for such an invasion for a variety of reasons. What are we doing here folks.

The CTA: Overcrowded trains & no seats on weekends because f you & the best way to drive down ridership is making service worse for alleged low usage times, i.e. the entire weekend.

(cont.) and idk about the whole "increased security/cleanliness" claims. Obviously I don't know what details made them choose this, but it seems like an odd choice - especially when overall weekend ridership is growing. Here is the alert on the website: www.transitchicago.com/travel-infor...

This seems like a bad idea. Brown, blue, orange and purple trains will reduce in size during the off peak times. For some reason

Congress is currently working on two bills that will determine how much the U.S. invests in passenger rail over the near term. Both are failures. Learn more about the federal budget process and how you can help make sure trains come out on top in 2026:

Updated with Sen. Bill Cunningham’s response (and a few others): Cunningham says Warren told him this morning he is looking forward to further discussions.

This sounds very official and final, but Bears officials cautioned that the board’s vote does not mean Hammond is a done deal. And they haven't even selected a site yet. It's less official than when they spent $200 million to buy land in Arlington Heights.

yknow maybe we can bring the Arizona Cardinals back to Chicago

Cronin: While I’m being told that the Bears announcement on Hammond is “real”, i.e. not a leverage play, a league source told me that the Bears leaving the state is not a done deal and “Illinois can still get back in the race.”

Honestly I wish we’d even do fences in Chicago. I’m not sure if the elevated stations could support the weight. The highway median stations need these yesterday. They should all look like the Cermak-McCormick place tube

or at least the dems on the transportation & infrastructure committee are (including Emilia Sykes here in OH). it hasn’t made it to the floor yet for a vote still time to call your reps & tell them to reject the Build America 250 Act and fight for investments in transit and bike/ped infrastructure.

I love when I try to take transit to a meeting but my MD-N train is not running full speed and inexplicably slow the entire way. Now I’m not sure how late I’ll be. I had plenty of time. Thanks Metra!

How apropos: CFD just came to the scene of a … something around the corner from me. Their ladders comfortable reached the roof of a four floor vintage single-stair building on a narrow street and over cars.

Yesterday I pulled over to point out to a UPS driver parked in the bike lane in front of 3311 N Clark that he could’ve pulled up to the curb only to be told “Are you serious? Fuck you. I hope you get hit by a car!” by the UPS driver. I have zero sympathy for people opposing these things.