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Bus to Zipcar to Divvy? RideScout App Makes Connecting A Bit Easier
The number of transportation choices available to Chicagoans continues to grow, particularly as shared options like car-sharing and Divvy bikes become ever more popular. Yet these options can turn the simple act of planning a trip across town into a complicated exercise that requires weighing multiple factors, like cost, convenience, time, and ever-changing availability. RideScout, a new app that was recently updated to include Chicago, presents numerous transportation choices all within a single smartphone screen. After factoring in your origin, destination, and the time of day, RideScout compares choices like walking, bicycling, Divvy bike-sharing, Metra, CTA trains and buses, taxis, Zipcar, and SideCar shared rides.
May 27, 2014
Evanston Catches Residents Off Guard by Suggesting Bike Bans
A survey to collect resident feedback about the draft Evanston Bike Plan launched yesterday, and some of the questions have alarmed residents and advocates. The survey has several odd questions, beginning with a requirement that respondents complete a quiz about bicycling laws. What truly alarmed respondents like Wheel & Sprocket store manager Eric Krzystofiak, though, is a question asking, "should bikes be prohibited from the following roads if alternate parallel biking corridors are established?"
May 21, 2014
Believe It or Not, Evanston Mulling More Bike Bans
Evanston has a reputation as one of Chicagoland’s most progressive suburbs. That could change if the city’s bike plan update, intended to encourage more pedaling, takes the counterproductive step of recommending banning bikes on some streets. Earlier this month, a public input session for the plan left many locals distressed about the possibility of the city “restricting” cycling on segments of some roads.
May 16, 2014
Illiana Boondoggle Now Guaranteed to Cost Taxpayers At Least $250 Million
Remember the "innovative" public-private partnership Governor Quinn lauded as a way to build the "21st century" Illiana Expressway, without shifting the entire cost onto the general public? Or remember CMAP's statement opposing the project, based on its contradictory growth projections, overestimated benefit to the region, and severe financial risk, and the multiple op-eds and articles that followed, all expressing concern about the expressway's ability to garner enough toll revenue to pay for itself?
May 7, 2014
Don’t Despair, Evanston & Oak Park May Still Get Divvy Stations
Last month, it was a bummer when the Illinois Department of Transportation announced $52.7 million in funding for transportation projects, including many bike and pedestrian projects, but the expansion of Divvy into the suburbs wasn’t one of them. However, officials say they’re hopeful money can be found to extend the system past the city limits.
May 6, 2014
Environmental Groups Charge Illiana Illegally Bypassed CMAP
The Illiana Expressway encountered a potential roadblock in the form of a lawsuit filed last Thursday.
April 25, 2014
A Plan to Fill the Hole in Rosemont’s Heart
The northwest suburban village of Rosemont has always been divided by busy transportation routes that funnel people through a crossroads. Occupying the geographic center of the town is a giant interchange, where the Kennedy Expressway, the Jane Addams (Northwest) Tollway, the Tri-State Tollway, and the I-190 spur to O'Hare Airport tangle over 300 acres of land -- an area larger than Grant Park and Millennium Park combined. Overhead, a steady stream of jets roar into O'Hare. CTA Blue Line trains roll down the Kennedy's median, toward the airport or a CTA facility within the interchange.
April 21, 2014
CNT and Active Trans Launch “Transit Future” Funding Campaign
On Monday, Governor Quinn’s Northeast Illinois Public Transit Taskforce released its final report, underscoring the need for better funding for regional transit. Yesterday, the Center for Neighborhood Technology and the Active Transportation Alliance launched a new campaign, dubbed "Transit Future," to raise that money via a new Cook County-based revenue stream that would help the region leverage federal dollars.
April 4, 2014
Regional Transit Needs New Funding to Meet $20 Billion Backlog
Transit systems in Northeastern Illinois face a $20 billion maintenance backlog. Now the question is how to pay for it.
April 2, 2014
Final State Task Force Report Dives Into Transit Reform Details
Governor Pat Quinn’s northeastern Illinois task force released its final report [PDF] yesterday, detailing recommendations from its mid-March draft. The task force launched last year, after former Metra CEO Alex Clifford resigned to protest the commuter rail operator's long-running patronage culture.
April 1, 2014