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* Tribune transportation reporter Talia Soglin…
Regional transportation officials agreed Thursday to transfer $74 million from Pace and Metra to the CTA in an effort to delay catastrophic transit cuts in Chicago next year.
After an at-times lively discussion, Regional Transportation Authority board members unanimously approved the measure, which is a bid to buy more time as they hope state lawmakers will pass long-term funding for public transit during a legislative veto session in October.
The Chicago region’s transit agencies are facing a budget shortfall in the hundreds of millions next year as federal pandemic aid runs out. If lawmakers — who failed to pass transit funding during their spring legislative session — don’t come to their rescue, the CTA, Metra and Pace will be forced to cut service up to 40%. But the CTA was expected to run out of federal dollars first, months before Metra and Pace.
The decision to shift funds around means the CTA is now expected to hit its fiscal cliff in the middle of 2026. Metra is expected to hit its cliff mid-to-late 2026, with Pace’s cliff not expected until 2027, according to the RTA.
* Daily Herald…
Director Brian Sager, who represents McHenry County, worried about the “vagueness” of the recommendation and lack of guarantees it would only be a one-time diversion.
“What will Metra and Pace be sacrificing?” he asked. […]
Sager argued the fiscal cliff “is here today and by taking this action we are continuing to postpone … that agony. Why isn’t it better to force our legislators right now to see the reality of where we are today with CTA?”
The transit system is intertwined and major cuts to one agency impact the whole, RTA Chairman Kirk Dillard of Hinsdale noted.
“If you have a Pace bus show up at a Metra station and there’s no Metra train, that’s a problem,” he said. “We’re one region — all three service boards (need) to be working as one system, more today than ever.”
* The RTA directors also discussed fare increases and caps on a popular but over-budget rideshare program. Streetsblog Chicago…
As Chicagoland faces a $771 million transit fiscal cliff, the disability community could be particularly hard-hit by service cuts. And already the Regional Transportation Authority is trying to address an ADA Paratransit budget shortfall for the 2025 fiscal year. Today the agency’s board of directors voted to fund this year’s shortfall. “2025 ADA ridership will exceed budget by 1.3 million to 1.8 million rides, producing a potential shortfall of $35 million to $65 million in the absence of mitigating actions,” the agency explained in a blog post today.
RTA says it has developed an ADA Paratransit Action Plan with the goal of mitigating, “the continued, unsustainable growth in RAP and TAP ridership and costs.” These are Pace’s Taxi Access Program and Rideshare Access Program, which subsidize these modes as an alternative to traditional transit and Paratransit. The action plan called for the following changes, which were approved by the RTA board in June as part of the plan (their language):
• “Pace establishing a 30 ride per month cap for both RAP and TAP”
• “Restoring the current $2 RAP and TAP fares to match traditional ADA at $3.25″
• “Offering free rides on all system-wide fixed route service to ADA-certified riders, which is currently offered only on Pace fixed routes”
These changes, discussed at six July community meetings, will go into effect on October 1.
* Evanston Now…
[Marla Davis, who has two adult sons with intellectual disabilities], and about 15 other riders or their relatives urged the RTA not to limit the number of trips. […]
RTA board members were sympathetic, but said only about 5% of the system’s nearly 300,00 RAP/TAP riders take more than 30 monthly trips, and subsidizing more than that could jeopardize the entire service.
RTA chair Kirk Dillard told the advocates that “we have to make adjustments so the program remains sustainable.” […]
Originally, the idea a few years ago was to get paratransit users out of the more expensive fixed-route vans, and into taxis and rideshare vehicles.
But about a third of RAP/TAP users turned out to be new riders, not those switching from fixed route vans. So the savings never materialized, and the expenses went up, to $2.3 million per month just for the additional third.
Thoughts?
* More…
* Tribune | As CTA tax district rakes in huge amount of taxpayer money, decision looms over what to do with it: The district has already taken in just under $400 million since 2017. It is on track to pay off a major facelift of four Chicago Transit Authority stations and the century-old infrastructure connecting them way ahead of schedule and estimated to bring in just shy of $100 million annually by 2031. The billion-dollar question is whether the CTA will keep receiving cash infusions from the district to help pay for future projects once the first phase is paid off, or if the money will instead be recouped by the city and other taxing bodies that are facing their own looming budget catastrophes.
posted by Isabel Miller
Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 10:15 am
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== Thoughts? ==
So an immediate transit disaster has now been staved off for a year. Guess there is no need for a special session to deal with an immediate problem. Plenty of time for everyone to devlope a long term solution and enact it in next year’s regular session.
Comment by RNUG Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 10:24 am
If there’s one thing the RTA and other transit agencies know how to do, it’s delay.
Nice to see them using their powers for good.
Comment by Casper the Ghost Bus Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 10:25 am
Chicago will just keep taking from the rest of the state- Under the current leadership, and get away with it
CTA
CPS
Bears
the list goes on and on
Comment by My kind of town Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 10:33 am
Why are suburban legislators not going crazy here? I get there isn’t really a good answer to their potential outrage, (when has that stopped anyone) but this is an amazing amount of trust they are putting in the RTA et al. Not even expressing “concern” that this isn’t a giant give away to the CTA/Chicago/Da Mayor. I really dont understand the lack of reaction here. Maybe someone can explain it to me. Riding the Metra these days is no picnic, that money sure would be nice to have to improve the daily ride in the old BNSF.
Comment by Red Ranger Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 10:35 am
===Why are suburban legislators not going crazy here?===
This is not operating money.
Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 10:39 am
The DuPage RTA sales tax is turning into a CTA bailout tax. This is exactly what was promised would NOT happen when the RTA sales tax was presented to DuPage County voters.
Comment by Dupage Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 11:03 am
I used to ride the bus/el downtown to Lewis towers 4/5 days a week for swim team. Skipping over the fact that no one would let a grammar school kid do that now, I recently checked to see how long that would take now. In my memory it was about an hour. According to google that trip would take over an hour and a half. Making an afternoon practice impossible. I was shocked, I hadn’t realized how service was so much worse. I had just gotten used to it, I guess.
Comment by Banish misfortune Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 11:09 am
Helpful context Rich. That said, this was an interesting quote from the Trib:
“Now, the CTA will receive all of the RTA’s discretionary funding in 2026, and Metra and Pace will receive none.”
That should go over well in Northbrook.
Comment by Red Ranger Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 11:16 am
There are all sorts of countries around the world that have well functioning public transit systems. Do they know something we don’t know? Or is it just a lack of motivation to make the system work?
Comment by Friendly Bob Adams Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 11:21 am
“Why isn’t it better to force our legislators right now to see the reality of where we are today with CTA?”
Not a bad question, though this move seems to show that there was regional funding available the whole time that RTA was spending add money that a crisis was just around the corner. Between RTA, CTA, Metra, and Pace, it can be hard to see past their respective advocacies for their own agencies to what the reality is. Someone needs to cut through that.
Comment by NIU Grad Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 11:32 am
== That should go over well in Northbrook. ==
Metra going over the cliff in September instead of November so the CTA can go over the cliff in June instead of April really doesn’t change the larger financial calculus all that much for any of the agencies, or the politicians.
Comment by StarLineChicago Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 11:33 am
===Sager argued the fiscal cliff “is here today and by taking this action we are continuing to postpone … that agony. Why isn’t it better to force our legislators right now to see the reality of where we are today with CTA?”===
This is exactly why that governance system needs to be changed before it gets one more thin dime.
Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 11:40 am
Starline, my point in all of this is the politics, not the policy. As a suburbanite, I could careless what happens to the CTA. I do care what happens to Metra. To me, seems like Metra is getting the short end of the stick here. I ride Metra roundtrip 4 times a week. I rarely get a seat. The AC works only about 75% of the time in the summer. Plus there are plenty of delays. That said, how is this helping Metra?
Comment by Red Ranger Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 11:59 am
===That said, how is this helping Metra? ===
Sounds like Metra wasn’t helping itself. It could’ve used that money long ago to perform the upgrades you want. It didn’t.
Again, this whole thing is a gigantic reason to break up this goofy system.
Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 12:22 pm
What in the governance system needs to be changed? Metra is a different service than the CTA and Pace.
Outside of rush hour Metra trains run once an hour. That is different than trains and buses (CTA) that run 24/7 in some cases.
And don’t get me started on the Pace Bus Tracker that is useless. And when you complain they say know about the problem. Imagine the nice Cheerios people saying we know the cereal is poisoned.
There have to be people in this world who have run transportation systems who can diagnose and have solutions. One easy one at Pace is to pick up the phone and call the software folks who run the tracker.
Comment by Jerry Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 12:56 pm
== As a suburbanite, I could careless what happens to the CTA. I do care what happens to Metra. ==
Not everyone who rides Metra is fortunate enough to have a destination within walking distance of wherever they’re getting off the train, or a private shuttle bus to take them wherever. It’s a single network but we refuse to treat it as such, which is a big part of how we ended up here in the first place.
Comment by StarLineChicago Friday, Aug 22, 25 @ 1:17 pm