I sent this email to metra via their contact form:
Message: This might be categorized wrong but why haven’‘t you thoughtof
keeping in and rebuilding the third track from Evanston to the OTC?
passengers from the suburbs (highland park, Kennilworth) would love to take
a train that’'s partly express. but don’t forget about evanston and south
of it
I got this response:
Thank you for your recent email regarding Union Pacific (UP) North Line
service.
As you may be aware, there is a major project underway to reconstruct 22
aging bridges along the line on the north side of Chicago. Due to the
complexity of the project, construction was postponed until Spring 2011.
While the bridge construction project is on hold and additional alternatives
analysis is completed, we will vigorously monitor and maintain each bridge,
performing necessary repairs as needed, until construction resumes. In
addition, we will be exploring engineering options that provide for
maintaining a two-track operation when construction resumes. As
information, construction updates for the entire project will be posted on www.Metrarail.com
only complaints I should see are from people from Evanston.
Well, you ought to start by asking why the 3rd track was installed in the first place, and whether that reason is still valid today. The reason this was a 3-track
well you are right there. the line does work efficiently with two tracks and the only hope of ever seeing freight go down that line would be if local industries decided to use UP as their form of transport. they should’ve never taken out the freight line because they only have one UP line that goes to Proviso from the north now
The New Line has been C&NW’s primary freight line between Chicago and Milwaukee ever since it was built around 1900 for the purpose of getting through freights out of the North Shore area. I don’t think that it’s suffering from capacity constraints at this time.
For 1/2 hour service, a local can make it to Wilmette (MP 16.6) from Ogilvie before being overtaken by a following non-stop.
For more frequent peak service, the skip-stop pattern is used; but an express would need the third track.
About four intermediate stops are needed for an express to overtake and pass the stopping train; and the cumulative distances between stations may exceed that needed to clear opposing traffic with bi-directional running in am & pm peaks.
Local demand for Metra service is growing in Chicago as the result of neighborhood gentrification where a number of stations had been closed in 1958. A stop officially has be requested at Petersen Av, even though a quarter of its commutershed extends across Rosehill Cemetery. Some inquiries also have been made for a stop between Diversey and Belmont.
There are few if any remaining freight customers along the North Line south of Lake Bluff; and there is little likelihood that a rail-centered business would be a better land use or compatible with its neighbors.
The last business with a spur was S&C Electric just north of Petersen, and that was removed about three years ago. The only other spurs that exist up and down through there are for MOW use. One problem with reinstalling the third main would be that south of Ravenswood, many homes are built up right against the old ROW. What might work well is the use of interlockings and crossovers to run faster trains around slower ones. But when it comes to places like Wilmette, we’d probably kill a dozen people a week doing that. They like to cross against the gates and in front of trains there, trust me. Remember, too, that the third track only went from Clybourn to Canal Tower in Evanston, roughly about ten miles. It wasn’t like the third track on the Northwest Line (Harvard Sub), which runs from Clybourn almost to Barrington. I haven’t worked that line for almost five years, but IIRC that’s about 27 miles. Optimally, a two-track CTC line with interlockings and stations with under or overpasses (no direct grade level passenger crossings) would work the best, IMO. From Wilmette and Kenilworth and Glencoe on north, station-wise that option’s just not gonna happen. OTOH, they are building a pedestrian underpass at Ravinia Park, a station used only seasonally. And then there’s the confusion of “what side is the train on?” We’ve been running lefthanded for over a century but there’s still folks who didn’t get the memo.
On the freight side of the house, there hasn’t been a 40th Street Yard in decades, which eliminated the need for connections via the Skokie and Weber lines. The Skokie connected with the New Line (UP Milw Sub) at Valley (south of Highland Park), and the Weber connected just south of Canal Tower in Evanston with the Kenosha Sub via the interlocking at Mayfair (Weber to the north, Cragin to the south). There is not a huge amount of traffic to the north of Proviso, despite its being technically the shortest
Don’t even have schedule windows to single-track trains, let alone for over-takes.
As for Wilmette and Kenilworth, grade separation would help for expresses to Glencoe; but with growing traffic, skip-stop expresses (that also pose a hazard at passed stations) would get more commuters downtown more frequently without the expense of a third track. The downside of skip-stop is loss of intermediate service between any two stations.