Lollapalooza

I used the Milwaukee West Elgin line to get to and from the Lollapalooza every day last weekend. The trains tended to run 15 min. late and standing room only. However this was a very efficient system and I was glad to have it. Metra seemed to do a better job with the passenger load than SEPTA does in Philadelphia on many a regular event. Double round trip fare for $5 on the Metra (lasting both days of the weekend!) could not be beat... it's a wonder why anyone would drive downtown.

The crowd at Elmhurst waiting for the train on that Saturday was unreal. I never seen so many people waiting outside of rushhour. Their train was delayed 30 minutes due to a frieght parked on the inbound main. It sat blocking traffic in town for 45 minutes. The inbound pulled right up to the tailend of the frieght and waited. aw..the joys of riding the union pacific west line!

Service for the 2007 Lollapalooza features extra seating capacity and no bikes and liquor allowed.

However, there's 8 extra trains running on the BNSF both Saturday and Sunday.

MetraBNSF wrote:Service for the 2007 Lollapalooza features extra seating capacity and no bikes and liquor allowed.

However, there's 8 extra trains running on the BNSF both Saturday and Sunday.

And as usual, it's the only line running extra trains, although longer 8-9 car sets will see a lot of action on other lines to compensate. While you wouldn't expect it on UP, I've never quite understood why Metra doesn't run extra service for events like this on the Rock, or Milw; lines it owns/operates directly. Labor/cost considerations, perhaps...

http://metrarail.com/Service_Advisories/lolla2007.html

There were some interesting equipment changes on the BNSF for the Friday evening service. Train 1241, which also turns into train 1280 and makes multiple runs the rest of the evening used an 8 car set and had a double header, usually this set is 6 cars. Train 1243, which also turns into train 1288 and makes multiple runs the rest of the evening was cut to 8 cars vs. the usual 6 cars after coming off 1243. Various other afternoon rush trains used different trainsets.

I wouldn't be surprised if at least one 9 or 10 car set is used this weekend. Just a few weeks ago, I think I saw a 10 car set being used on a Saturday.

Metra also added unpublicized extra's on the Rock. Train's were cut into 6 car sets as usual, however train #514 ran express from Blue Island and had a 9 car train waiting at Vermont Street to run on the branch. Train #531 was also had an express train.

MetraBNSF wrote:I wouldn't be surprised if at least one 9 or 10 car set is used this weekend. Just a few weeks ago, I think I saw a 10 car set being used on a Saturday.

I didn't expect an 11-car set to be used for one of extras on Saturday and Sunday. Although the first car closest to the locomotive was closed.

And speaking of the unexpected, although there were no extras, Lollapalooza service on UP/W looked very much like the weekends during Taste of Chicago; nearly every train was 9 cars on both days, with at least 7 cars open in most cases.

This would've probably been a good weekend to keep UP/NW's 11-car set intact for the entire weekend, don't know if they actually did or not...

UP-NW did keep 11 cars running.. it was on a train I took out to Arlington Heights on Sunday night... ran on the 8:30 departure. It actually made no sense to keep this set 11 cars, as only 5 cars were open on the train.. By the time we got to Arlington, the train was 12 minutes late.