15 Jan 05 Blogger — 1/15 06:08 PM

Chicagoans have a right, at this point, to start getting exceptionally pissed with the Chicago Transit Authority, and, if they wish, with Mayor Richard Daley, too.

The CTA has just decided to pull a double-whammy announcement on Chicagoans. Their first announcement is that their Brown Line reconstruction project is $22 million over budget, and, as a result, they face a twofold choice: either shut down stations while their renovation proceeds (presumably because it costs more money to renovate a station while keeping it running), or the renovation has to be extremely bare bones.

At the same time, they decided to warn Chicagoans that if Illinois doesn’t give us public funding in a couple of months, they’ll pull out all the stops in terms of ripping money out of Chicagoans’ wallets: cash fares will be higher, as will rush hour fares; buses and trains will have different fares; and service will be cut far more than the original January 2005 service cuts.

At this point, the management of the Chicago Transit Authority has progressed past poor and into malpractice. They’ve totally failed at the duty they’ve been called upon to do, and I think there needs to be a lot of slapping around by Daley. But since Kruesi is his best bud, that’s never going to happen, and as a result, Chicago’s mass transit system is on the road to hell. And, unfortunately, I’ll have a front-row seat. Crap.