Evanston: Main (19:21 – 22:15)

At about 19:38 large concrete ramps appear on the left side of the screen. These were new elevated approaches for the Evanston CTA line. In the mid-80′s CTA decided to switch pairings of the North-South (Howard/Englewood-Jackson Park) and West-South (Lake-Dan Ryan) routes to better align traffic levels. This necessitated many infrastructure projects, including a rebuild of Howard Yard facilities to allow for a larger number of cars to be stored. The rebuild lasted roughly ten years, and these new ramps were one of the first phases. In between about 19:57 and 22:07 five ramps to street level appear between the CTA and C&NW. These ramps from cross-streets to the track level between the ‘L’ and C&NW ROWs at various points were built during the project to elevate both right-of-ways above grade. Former C&NW engineer Doug Davidson mentioned that the C&NW had a team track along one of these ramps south of Main Street, which he confirmed by providing a period trade magazine article. Sanborn Fire Insurance maps from the 1920′s confirm that there were three different C&NW team tracks along these ramps. According to Graham Garfield, of chicago-l.org, A 1910 Engineering News-Record article about the elevation project briefly talks about the ramps, saying, “There were a number of inclined teamways required by the Chicago & Northwestern Ry. adjoining the right-of-way and at these points it was necessary to build retaining walls. These teamways are on a 3% grade, making a total length of about 265 ft. of wall in each case.” The article also goes into detail about how the elevation was carried out (because the Northwestern Elevated Railroad half of the elevated embankment and the C&NW half, while built at about the same time, were not built precisely simultaneously, so it required some smart phasing). At 21:35 we see a southbound train of CTA 2600-series cars in their original color scheme pulling into the Main Street CTA station. As this was Sunday and it is a two-car train we can assume it is a Linden-Howard shuttle.

One Comment

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    As the train pulls out of the station at 21:35 we see a train of CTA 2600-series cars in original scheme moving southbound.


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