CTA Tattler

The showdown turned stalemate

Here's a scary El moment, brought to you by a Tattler reader. Post your fun stories here and we'll spotlight the best of them.

I once witnessed a pretty scary moment. But first lemme say that I myself have spent some good times in the Hobo Corner. It's a good place to have a drink or whatever.

So anyway, I was on the Orange Line going to Midway. The car I was on wasn't that full. But the key players in this story are: a young white girl, sitting alone; a young scary looking Mexican kid, maybe 20-23 years old sitting directly behind her; a middle aged black guy (not a professional, but not a bum or anything); and a few randoms.

So we're riding, and all of the sudden I hear someone (it turned out to be the Mexican kid) yell "BOOM!!!" And you see people on the train kind of looking around like what the hell was that? It turned out that this Mexican kid had pointed his finger at the back of the girl's head like it was a gun and pretended to pull the trigger.

So he gets up (this is around the Randolph Orange Line stop) and he walks up to the black guy and stands right in front of him -- and you can tell the Mexican guy is totally wasted. Either tripping or drunk or I don't know .... But he was in another world. And he gets in the black guy's face, and he starts saying, “You hungry man? You hungry???”

CTA Insider on role of the "customer assistant"

Here's another contribution from our anonymous "CTA Insider," telling us about the CTA's "customer assistants." (Email me or click comments below to post a question for him/her.)

The "CA" (customer assistant) position was made to cover the "ticket agent" position that was being phased out.

What happened was the ticket agent was a money-handling job. With the new fare machines being implemented, that was turned into a graveyard of employees who were picking that job and they were grandfathered into the position. As it is those employees hadn't been picking the RTO (rail transit operator) position in decades in some instances. They would need to be retrained as RTOs ... and these are not the people you want running your railroad. Age was a factor too.

So the union made a deal to save those jobs and leave them in jobs that they were most comfortable with -- though those jobs may not be the best for them. (Many times I've cringed at the CAs' responses to simple questions).

It is also a training position for new hires when no spots are open in RTO training.

About the dogs: The K9s were under outside contracts that I believe have run out and may be up for bid now or they feel they don't need them anymore. There were many customer complaints about the dogs' treatment and the handlers training was brought into question.

I got hit in the leg by the muzzle on one dog as he lunged at me and the handler thought it was funny (untrained dog + untrained handler = LAWSUITS!!!)

Now we have badly paid security guards with no weapons guarding equipment that no one can steal. (They are not there for the people.)

Let's invade CTA chair's blog!

The competition is mounting! CTA Chair Carole Brown now has her own blog, as Tony from Save Chicago Transit and a commenter here have noted this week.  She invites questions and comments, so we should take her up on it!

Her post about the Progress in Springfield contained this interesting note:

"CTA's fares have increased over 95% since 1983, faster than the rate of inflation. Metra fares have increased just 20%. If CTA had received sufficient funding to hold fares to a 20% increase, today's fare would be just $1.10, and ridership would be 70 million trips higher."

We'll keep an eye on her and report interesting stuff she utters. Meanwhile, we should be asking her some of the questions that the CTA Insider answers.

CTA Insider on "waiting for signals ahead"

Here's the CTA Insider (details here) on what "waiting for signals ahead" really means:

There are track sections that are controlled by signal trips. These trips are metal bars that, after a train makes it past, roll up to keep another train from entering that section of track.

If a train tries to enter this section ahead of schedule the trip hits a switch on the underside of the undercarriage and throws the train into "emergency." That stops the train completely and the motorperson has to reset the train, plus explain to the Control Center how a trip was hit. (The controllers can see on their boards that one was hit.)

When the motorperson gets to the next terminal they are taken out of service, and have to make a drug/alcohol drop. They are interviewed by a manager the next time a manager has an opening, and not allowed to work until after all these criteria are met.

That's what happened on the Brown line that time the Brown/Purple hit each other, only the motorman had gotten clearance to proceed ahead through a trip and then managed to rearrange his front end.

[Got a question for the CTA Insider on what happens behind the scenes at the CTA? Either email me or pose the question in Comments below.]

The traveling circus on El train

Last week a friend and I rode the Red Line home from U.S. Cellular Field after the White Sox beat the Twins to win the two-game series.

I thought we were riding on a traveling circus car. First, two 14-year-old boys sat across from each other, taking turns shooting dice. One had a deft move with the dice where he snapped his fingers after each roll. I soon figured out rolling a 7 meant you gave up the dice.

Meanwhile, further down the aisle, two dudes in their early-20s lay completely prone in their seats, long legs reaching across the aisle to rest on the other seat.

At the Washington stop, two 20-something gals in black shirts boarded, one pushing a bike and wearing a fire-engine red bicycle helmet. Beyond those two, I see a 30-ish guy in a blue oxford shirt feverishly typing away on a laptop.

At Belmont, a 30-ish guy boards and stands across from us. He's wearing a white pleated shirt, gray charcoal pants with a white pinstripe through them, and carrying a medium-sized black purse with a pink ribbon affixed.

Finally, a blind guy comes tapping through with his cane, begging for money.

Just another night on the traveling circus known as the Red Line.

Kinder, gentler celling

A woman sits next to me on the Red Line heading into the Loop and pulls her cell phone out of her purse. Oh, great! I thought. I have to withstand another inane cell phone conversation. And really, who do you have to talk to at 7:30 a.m.

But she fools me. She starts furiously thumbing the keypad on her phone and then presses Send with a slight smile on her face. Within two to three minutes, her phone buzzes. She reads the reply, and then answers in turn. She repeats this for three rounds of text messages.

How civilized.

As opposed to the woman behind us, whining on her phone at the same time to a friend about how hard it is to buy her first home. It's so hard, she keeps saying. Finally, she hangs up, and I notice her eyes have teared up.

Sorry, I just didn't know it was that hard!

Kruesi asks for suburbs' sales tax hike

He speaks! Yes, that was CTA president Frank Kruesi calling on the state legislature to increase the state sales tax for the collar counties to 1% to help pay for increased funding to the CTA. Cook County already pays 1% in sales tax for mass transportation.

Read the Tribune story for some interesting tidbits about how much each area contributes to CTA/RTA funding.

Also, Redeye, the Tribune's sister publication, features a fun column by transit writer Alison Neumer about CTA behavior guidelines, and how the offenses will only worsen if the CTA cuts service in July.

CTA Insider on "where have all the janitors gone?"

Recently a CTA employee contacted me to say he would like to contribute anonymously to this blog about what happens behind the scenes on the CTA. He (though I'm not sure it's a he) only requests that I refer to him as the CTA Insider. Here is his first tidbit:

Where did all the Janitors go?

The janitorial department is down to a skeleton crew on the Brown Line. Workers are being assigned to clean five stations per janitor, meaning on the evening shift there may be just two people on an entire line.

Some lines on a Saturday or Sunday have one person to cover everything. Subway is the same way.

[Got a question for the CTA Insider on what happens behind the scenes at the CTA? Either email me or pose the question in Comments below.]

Prone Vertical sleeper

People like to sleep on the El or bus. That's not unusual. I see sleepers virtually every day on the Red Line. But this day was different.

I saw a woman sleeping while standing.

I could see her eyeballs kinda rolled up in the back of her eye sockets. She stood right by the doorway, her pinky finger barely hanging on to the pole.

Do you sleep on the train or bus? Do you ever oversleep? Do you worry about missing your stop?

Split personalities

I board the Red Line going north at North And Clybourn at about 8:30 p.m. I sit next to a big, tall, fat guy talking on his cell phone.

Call No. 1: "Hi, this is Bob, the manager of the Doubletree Inn in Skokie. We would like to discuss the bed you and your five boy friends broke down when you stayed at our hotel last week. We would like to be informed about how you plan to compensate us for the cost of the bed. You have my number."

Call No. 2: "Hi, this is Jason. We were just wondering if you guys were ever going to call us again or if you're, like, avoiding us. You have my cell number is you decide to call.