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Metra, Pace and the CTA lost millions during the COVID-19 pandemic, when ridership dropped. They now face a combined $730 million annual budget shortfall starting in 2026, when federal COVID-19 relief ends. At the behest of the General Assembly, a prepared Plan of Action for Regional Transit (PART) report includes a controversial recommendation to integrate Metra, Pace and the CTA into one supersized agency.
Summary and audio linked here.
Chicago’s political leadership is floating a pension buyout program as evidence it is seriously addressing the city’s thirty-six-billion-dollar unfunded pension liability, but Mark Glennon, founder of the Illinois policy research organization Wirepoints, said that the proposal moves debt from one column to another rather than reducing it, and that the broader fiscal picture facing the city continues to deteriorate across every measurable dimension. Audio here.
Expect no retraction or apology. This what they do.
The state’s existing buyout program for its own pensions is the precedent for Chicago, which should be a warning: Look out for similar exaggerated claims and shoddy analysis.
Full interview and summary linked here.
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The effects of the big city (Chicago) doom loop are taking toll. Additionally crime is forcing more into private modes of transportation rather than in potentially unsafe public transit. Chicago blew it yet continues to blow it by its soft on crime and assorted gimmicky tax hike among other things that are decomposing its downtown areas. No Chicago, no transit. Even BJ should be able to figure that out,
Driving Remains The Preferred Mode Of Transportation In Chicagoland — Metra Ridership In 2024 — Long After The Pandemic Ended — Is Projected (At Best) To Be Half Of What It Was Before The Pandemic