Belmont Flyover

The CTA says it's the first new, permanent track line to go into service since the Orange Line debuted in 1993.

The CTA appears to have recently made major progress on Belmont Flyover, officially called the Red-Purple Bypass, which will unclog the junction of the Red, Brown, and Purple lines.

Making the transfer between the Belmont and Addison stations via a shuttle will be rather time-consuming, so you might be better off just taking a regular bus instead of the train.

The project will increase capacity and reliability, and reduce crowding, but it will also include three-year closures of the Lawrence and Berwyn stops.

Now that the field of builders is narrowed down, the CTA will invite the potential bidders to submit proposals on how they would design and build the project.

More than three dozen residents showed up for the hearing at the Center on Halsted.

It’s going to be important for the city to learn the mistakes of the past, particularly the failure to promptly redevelop several lots that were left empty for five or more years after the Brown Line reconstruction was finished.

It came as no surprise, but it was still a relief, when officials announced today that the $1 billion federal grant for the CTA’s Red and Purple Modernization project has been approved.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel's office has started crafting an ordinance that would activate a state law allowing the city to create "transit TIF districts" – officially called Transit Facility Improvement Areas – around four transit projects, according to the Chicago Tribune. Boundaries could be drawn up to a half mile around Chicago’s Union Station (to fund the improvements recommended in its master plan), the CTA’s North Side Main Line, the CTA’s Red Line extension to 130th, and the CTA’s Blue Line Congress branch modernization and possible extension.