Metra Extra/Modified Schedules

Interesting addition to SWS's online pdf schedule... they added a blank Saturday block. I have never seen anything like this before. I wonder if the paper schedules out today also reflect this.

Hahaha, if they do maybe I'll grab a fistfull of them and sell them on eBay years from now. "RARE: Misprinted Metra schedule!"

Although a past event, found this news release...

http://www.metrarail.com/Press_Releases/ElectionDay.pdf

Press Event to Announce Weekend Trains for Metra’s Southwest Service


CHICAGO, Feb. 27, 2009 – Congressman Daniel J. Lipinski will join Metra Chairman Carole Doris at Metra’s Oaklawn Station to announce the inauguration of weekend service on the Southwest Line to Manhattan, Ill.

What: First weekend train operations on Metra’s Southwest Service Line to Manhattan, Ill., to begin in March.

Who: Congressman Daniel Lipinski (D-3rd), Metra Chairman Carole Doris, Metra Executive Director Philip Pagano and RTA Board Member Judy Baar Topinka

Where: Oaklawn Metra Station 9525 W. Tulley Ave, Oaklawn, Ill.

When: Monday, March 2, 2009 at 10 a.m.

Rumor has it that service wont start for another three weeks until March 21st.

metraRI wrote:

Press Event to Announce Weekend Trains for Metra’s Southwest Service


CHICAGO, Feb. 27, 2009 – Congressman Daniel J. Lipinski will join Metra Chairman Carole Doris at Metra’s Oaklawn Station to announce the inauguration of weekend service on the Southwest Line to Manhattan, Ill.

What: First weekend train operations on Metra’s Southwest Service Line to Manhattan, Ill., to begin in March.

Who: Congressman Daniel Lipinski (D-3rd), Metra Chairman Carole Doris, Metra Executive Director Philip Pagano and RTA Board Member Judy Baar Topinka

Where: Oaklawn Metra Station 9525 W. Tulley Ave, Oaklawn, Ill.

When: Monday, March 2, 2009 at 10 a.m.

Rumor has it that service wont start for another three weeks until March 21st.

Turns out that the rumor is correct indeed...

http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2009 ... hwest.html

http://metrarail.com/Sched/sws/sws_new_service.html

Very interesting schedule for Saturday... It would appear that there will be two deadhead trains from CUS-Man, and Man-CUS. Unless two sets of equipment are going to be used. I still think the schedule has too much padding, especially when ridership will be very light at the beginning of this service. Metra is also extending the 12:35 weekday train all the way to Manhattan, which is an unexpected move.

Probably something along the lines of a face-saving measure (for lack of a better description). It would be pretty absurd if Manhattan and Laraway Road got more service on Saturdays than M-F, so it was in Metra's best interest to fix that little discrepency. Also note that New Lenox and Manhattan are clamoring for more Metra service as it is. I remember a New Lenox village official at Rep. Lipinski's meeting last year explained that weekend service would be great for them, but that better (off-peak) weekday service would be appreciated very much as well, because outside of rush hour their nice, new SWS station is essentially useless.

Metra could have added additional service to Manhattan with this schedule. Tho I'm not all familiar with how crews are assigned, I do know what is currently the 1:58 out of 179th is a new crew. Starting the 23rd, train #830 will start from Manhattan... but the set ends up at 179th, never going back to Manhattan... so some crew change must be taking place at 179th Street on one of the runs.

Instead of only having the mid-day run to Manhattan, #808 could have also started from Manhattan and #839 could have ended there... Having a train from Manhattan and New Lenox get downtown at 3:40 only gives a 2 hour time frame before the last train back, which also seems useless, but I guess its a start. Another thing interesting with the new schedule for #830 is that it follows the same time pattern for the weekend trains, instead of whats already in place for the current weekday runs... adding an additional 3 minutes to the schedule.

One of the best things about the new weekend schedule is that it allows passengers transferring to/from Amtrak trains at CUS to have direct service, instead of having to walk over from LaSalle. Speaking of which, the new schedule does seem to compliment existing RI service pretty well, although I wonder if 862 really needs to run that early. Oh, and I wouldn't worry so much about the padding, after all, I can think of at least three locations where the potential for "freight train interference" delays is pretty high.

I agree that the extension of trains 815 & 830 to Manhattan was done to synchronize the weekday service with the Saturday schedule, but railfans (like me) will appreciate the move most of all, since it'll make round trips there and back a lot more convenient...

So another South Side Irish parade has come and gone... once again plaguing RI with delays. This day has to be the busiest Sunday of the year for RI. Of course, no set was cut due to the crowds, so #215 (2:30 out of LaSalle) ran with 10 cars and was 30+ minutes late.... all but one car was not in use. Again, un-ad extra's ran. Two sets that I know of: A 9 car out of Joliet, the other 8 car from Blue Island. The extra Joliet bound train ran after #215. Not sure if there were multiple extra's to/from the Beverly Sub like last year.

metraRI wrote:.... all but one car was not in use.

Wait, so they ran a 10 car train with only one car accessible to the public, and it was over a half hour late?

Haha, oops. Lets fix that, all but one car was in use... so 9 of the 10 cars were open. And yes, #215 was 30 minutes behind schedule due to picking up big crowds between 103rd-111th.

As most already know, SWS Saturday service begins this Saturday. The start of this service has been all over southland papers, and I just recieved an email from the Trib also reguarding the service.

http://tribads.chicagotribune.com/admai ... /index.htm

Hopefully this turns out to be a 'big hit'. Time will tell.

metraRI wrote:So another South Side Irish parade has come and gone... once again plaguing RI with delays. This day has to be the busiest Sunday of the year for RI. Of course, no set was cut due to the crowds, so #215 (2:30 out of LaSalle) ran with 10 cars and was 30+ minutes late.... all but one car was not in use. Again, un-ad extra's ran. Two sets that I know of: A 9 car out of Joliet, the other 8 car from Blue Island. The extra Joliet bound train ran after #215. Not sure if there were multiple extra's to/from the Beverly Sub like last year.

Did at least one of the extras use the mainline south of Gresham?

doepack wrote:Did at least one of the extras use the mainline south of Gresham?

Nope, anyone going to the parade would be getting off in Beverly.. so putting a train on the mainline would cause more confusion. I have only taken Metra to the parade once, when they had a scheduled extra... which became extremely late and skipped past Midlothian and Robbins because of over crowding. I don't know if there is a way to better handle the crowds that get on at stations outside of downtown. On top of that, most stations on the branch have only 6 car platforms... making loading/unloading take even more time.