Bus and train riders who encountered the CTA at far less than its best on the first weekday of major service cuts should prepare themselves to slog through snow during Tuesday’s commute.
The CTA implemented a winter action plan Monday to ensure that bus motors start in the morning and that the fleet — downsized by almost 290 buses because of the service cuts — can get out of garages and storage yards and onto streets.
Snow-sweeper trains were to have operated through the night to make sure tracks are plowed for the approximately 130,000 CTA passengers who travel by train from 6 to 9 each morning, officials said.
Riders voiced frustration after putting up today with longer waits at bus stops and at rail station platforms, as well as enduring crowded conditions and longer travel times.
Carolyn Ephraim, who is financially supporting five grandchildren, said she worries that the CTA cuts will make her late for work at the Daley Center downtown.
“That jeopardizes my job,” said Ephraim, 55, who on Monday left home in Chicago’s Marquette Park neighborhood 20 minutes earlier than usual to offset any delays. Ephraim said she arrived barely on time.
She used to take the No. X49 Western Express bus, but it stopped operating Monday, and she now has to wait for the local Western Avenue bus, Ephraim said. “It’s slower than ever,” she said.
Lynneé Spencer, a South Sider who commutes to downtown Mondays and Wednesdays for college, said the No. 26 bus was crowded this morning, more so than usual.
Usually, when Spencer leaves home at 6:45 a.m., the bus is not crowded. That was not the case today. The Red Line this morning, which she takes to get her kids to school, was also unusually crowded, she said.
“I don’t know about the wait, just the capacity was an issue,” Spencer said.
It didn’t help that the number of CTA employees who failed to report for work Monday was twice the normal rate, officials said, declining to provide specific numbers.
Employees on standby filled in as much as possible. But on top of the reduced service, the CTA was forced to cancel 33 bus runs in the morning rush, officials said, out of a total of almost 1,500 runs.
Overall ridership on Monday appeared to be slightly lower than normal in response to the widely reported warnings of an 18 percent reduction in CTA bus service and a 9 percent cutback in train operations.
All Gloria Fleming, a social worker, wanted when she got off work Monday evening was a seat on the bus.
But when she saw there were no empty seats on the southbound No. 26 South Shore Express bus just after 5 p.m., she let the bus pass her by. Fleming let another packed bus pass, before resigning herself to stand on a third bus.
“I’ve been working all day. I just want a seat,” Fleming said.
Meanwhile, CTA President Richard Rodriguez called on union officials representing bus and rail employees to meet with him this week to try to negotiate a quick end to the service cuts, which resulted in the layoffs of about 1,100 employees.
Union officials agreed to meet, but no date was immediately set. They said they wanted to confer with their memberships before starting negotiations.
Rodriguez said he has a menu of ideas to chisel away at a $95.6 million budget deficit. CTA officials in late January offered the Amalgamated Transit Union a list of proposed union concessions totaling more than $76 million.
The unions have not agreed to any of those terms. But union leaders said they will gauge their membership’s support for $90.6 million in savings that the union chiefs recently proposed on their own to the CTA.
Darrell Jefferson, president of the bus drivers union, said he remains hopeful that the 903 members who were laid off from Local 241 will return to work once an agreement is reached.
“I just want the CTA to meet us in the middle of the road,” Jefferson said.
Robert Kelly, president of the rail workers union, said he will conduct a membership meeting Tuesday. But he said his rank and file in Local 308, which lost 112 members to the layoffs, has up until now opposed making any contract concessions.
Although it won’t be enough to cancel the service cuts, the CTA reached a tentative agreement with its trade unions to save 38 jobs, officials announced. The trade unionists, who perform maintenance and construction at CTA facilities, accepted proposals to take unpaid days and defer some wage increases in exchange for flexibility from the CTA side on issues important to them, CTA spokeswoman Noelle Gaffney said.
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–Jon Hilkevitch, Serena Daniels and Angie Leventis Lourgos
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Public Schools spokeswoman, said the gun was found inside a locker inside the building. She said ”movements inside the school were restricted” while police searched for the gun.
