Eyes on the Street: The Red Line Without Tracks

Friday will mark two months since the Chicago Transit Authority began overhauling and upgrading the Dan Ryan branch of the Red Line. The reconstruction is quite visible: A little more than one month into the project, all of the tracks had been removed, and work on the stations was plain to see.

The CTA reported last week that ridership on the shuttles and extended service of local routes indicates that about 90 percent of Red Line riders continue to take CTA, while 9.8 percent are using other means of travel or not making trips. The CTA estimates that almost half of the Red Line passengers switched to the Green Line, 5 percent switched to the Orange Line, and the rest use local routes and shuttles.

Mayor Emanuel and the CTA say the project is on schedule to wrap up by late October. When it's finished, the CTA expects ridership to bounce back and exceed previous levels, with reconstruction shaving up to 20 minutes off the roundtrip from 95th to Roosevelt.

After the jump, more photos of the reconstruction in progress.