CTA and Village of Skokie Offering One Week of Free Rides to Yellow Line Riders; free parking at Dempster lot through end of 2015
Chicago Transit Authority President Dorval R. Carter Jr. today was joined by the Village of Skokie Mayor George Van Dusen and Metropolitan Water Reclamation District (MWRD) officials to announce that Yellow Line service has been restored.
The Yellow Line was suspended in May following an embankment collapse that resulted from construction on MWRD property. The restoration of service follows the design and reconstruction of the embankment by MWRD and its contractor, Walsh Construction.
“We are pleased to announce the return of Yellow Line service to our riders and the Village of Skokie,” said CTA President Carter. “This was an unprecedented event but all parties involved have worked cooperatively to restore service as quickly and safely as possible. As a thank you to our riders for their patience, the CTA is offering free Yellow Line rides for one week beginning today.”
Free rides on CTA’s Yellow Line will be offered at the Dempster-Skokie and Oakton stations beginning today through Friday, November 6. In addition, CTA and the Village of Skokie will continue offering free parking at CTA’s Park and Ride facility at the Dempster-Skokie station through the end of 2015.
“The Village of Skokie also is pleased that Yellow Line service is resuming,” said Mayor Van Dusen. “The community has demonstrated considerable patience with this inconvenience and has shown strong support for the numerous businesses near the Yellow Line stations that rely on commuters as customers. We hope that ridership levels will quickly return to levels attained before the unfortunate service interruption, and encourage the community to take advantage of CTAs generous offer of free rides for the next week.”
To kick off the restoration of service on the Yellow Line, CTA President Carter was joined today by Mayor Van Dusen and MWRD officials for a ceremonial first ride on CTA’s two newest 5000-series rail cars—the last to be delivered recently from an order of 714 cars, part of CTA’s ongoing modernization of its rail fleet.
The return of service follows the completion of reconstruction work by MWRD and Walsh Construction. The work included the re-fencing of the right-of-way area between the tracks and MWRD property; the rebuilding and stabilization of the soil embankment; the reconstruction of approximately 1,200 feet of north and southbound Yellow Line tracks atop the embankment including ties, rail plates, fasteners, running rail and third rail; and reconnecting signals and communication lines.
“We thank Yellow Line riders, the CTA and residents and businesses in the Skokie area for their patience as we worked to restore the embankment along the Yellow Line,” said MWRD Executive Director David St. Pierre. “By taking the additional time and precaution to understand the embankment collapse, your patience has allowed us to fully stabilize the tracks for the long term and ensure a safe and comfortable ride for all passengers.”
To promote the reopening and encourage ridership to return, the CTA and Village of Skokie are undertaking significant outreach efforts to riders, residents and local businesses. Some of the efforts include customer fliers, signage at stations and key bus stops, social media outreach, customer audio alerts, messaging on CTA’s digital information screens system wide, targeted outreach to stakeholders, door to door outreach in the Village of Skokie, a countdown clock on CTA’s website and media outreach.
Following suspension of Yellow Line service in May, CTA took extensive efforts to minimize impacts to customers that included providing customers with free shuttle bus service in both directions that served the affected Yellow Line stations.
For more information, please visit: transitchicago.com/yellowreturn.
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