Passenger Bus, Rail and Motorcoach Industry News

One of the companies behind the Chicago Transit Authority’s Ventra open payment fare pass and debit card received an “F” rating from the Better Business Bureau. The rating was based on nearly 100 complaints in the last three years.

The plan maintains current service levels, freezes base fares, and continues investment to modernize and repair infrastructure to best serve customers.

Alderman Ameya Pawar vowed to save the route by using surplus funds from a local tax-increment-financing district. The CTA decided to eliminate the route and several others to save $16 million to address overcrowding on popular routes.

Stations along the north Red Line are some of the oldest on the system, with most being built in the early 1900s and in need of being rebuilt from the ground up.

The project, which begins in spring 2013, will completely rebuild the 43-year-old Red Line South — including all track, ties, ballast and drainage systems — from Cermak-Chinatown to 95th Street.

The new cars will replace the 2400-series and 2600-series cars — which are 35 years old — in service on the Red Line, and will eventually replace the entire fleet on the Red Line.

Provides for afternoon and evening shifts, which will be paid at straight time instead of overtime, and there will be greater flexibility in shift starting times. These are changes that will save around $750,000 annually.

Said the Chicago Transit Authority collected more federal aid than it should have after inflating mileage covered by its bus routes. Ordered the agency to revise its 2011 tally of revenue-producing miles and change the way it counts mileage from now on.

The visit highlighted the significant economic benefit that the MTA brings to upstate New York through its Capital Program. Bombardier has built more than 2,000 subway and commuter railcars for the MTA in Plattsburgh since it opened its railcar plant in 1995.

Nearly all of the new hires came to the CTA after they attended one of the agency’s three bus driver job fairs this summer, or heard or saw the advertisements for the fairs, all of which were held in the footprint of the Red Line project between Roosevelt Road and 95th Street.