Pink line: Lots of consecutive pairs...

Was downtown in the Loop today, and I saw several 4-car Pink line sets in consecutively ordered two-car pairs (i.e., 3161-64). Remember seeing several of these a few weeks ago as well, I think there could be a reason behind this, I've seen it often enough to suspect that there's more than coincidence at work. And if that weren't enough, I also saw an eight-car Brown line train composed entirely of 3400 series with the old pantograph equipment (wires removed, but roof boards still intact), also in a set of consecutively ordered cars (3441-48), which comprises half the fleet. Pretty interesting day...

Like this?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Married_pair

These units are the most common variety of married pair in that components are shared between cars and the coupler are of a semi-permanently type which cannot be separated in normal operation. However, with some effort the cars can be broken apart and re-paired with other units.

No, he's referring to the practice of assigning married pairs together in the order in which they were delivered. Example: 3201-3202, 3203-3204, 3205-3206 and 3207-3208 all in one train.

Doepack, I've seen that solid consis of ex-Skokie cars going around the loop on occasion and I'm just as curious about it as you are. I believe at one time those cars were "free roamers" on the brown line and didn't get any special treatment as far as train placement.

Does the CTA hire obsessive-compulsives yardmasters?

All kidding aside, I've noticed the former Skokie cars in matched sets lately too. Also, don't forget some cars were OEM with boards but not pans in case Skokie trains were extended further north. Guess that's not an issue now for a number of reasons.

Tadman wrote:Does the CTA hire obsessive-compulsives yardmasters?

After looking at those solid, consecutively numbered 4 & 8 car sets on Brown & Pink recently, I have to wonder...