Sears, Roebuck and Co. and the Pace suburban bus agency unveiled an unprecedented public-private transit plan Monday for thousands of Sears Merchandise Group employees whose jobs will move this summer from downtown Chicago to Hoffman Estates.
Getting to work in the suburbs has weighed heavily on the minds of many at Sears Tower, particularly minority workers who live on Chicago`s South Side and face possibly a 70-mile, round-trip commute to Sears` new headquarters development, called Prairie Stone.
Sears and Pace officials predict that of the 5,000 employees to relocate to Prairie Stone, about 1,550 may get to work on fixed-route buses, subscription buses and van pools, and 1,000 more may car-pool.
The program will cost an estimated $3.7 million, paid jointly by Pace, Sears and the Regional Transportation Authority. It is the largest such corporate transportation program ever attempted in the suburbs by Pace.
Pace predicts that of the 5,000 jobs to relocate to Prairie Stone, about 1,550 of the people who fill them may get to work on fixed-route buses, subscription buses and van pools. Sears estimates that another 1,000 may car pool.
”At one time, I estimated that we`d need only 2,800 parking places (at Prairie Stone), and I don`t see how we`ll be far off that number,” said C.W. ”Bill” Rule, transportation director for the Merchandise Group move.
Indeed, Sears is providing only 4,100 parking spaces for 5,000 relocating employees and 700 service workers to be hired locally-and those 4,100 slots include some 300 visitor spaces.
But some rank-and-file workers remain skeptical.
”It`s going to be hard, especially for people who live on the South Side,” said a Sears administrative assistant, an employee of 24 years who asked not to be identified.
Interviewed at lunch in a Sears Tower restaurant, the employee said that her commuting time would quadruple, from a 20-minute car pool ride up the Dan Ryan Expressway to a 90-minute journey to the far northwest suburbs.
Although she will have the option of taking a subscription bus from a pick-up point near her South Side home, she said she prefers the flexibility of her car: ”There are too many people on the bus, and you can`t stop off when you want to. If I get tired, I`ll quit.”
Other employees, like attorney Tom Hornacek, don`t expect their commuting time to change much. Hornacek said that he pays about $100 a month for an hourlong Metra train ride from Naperville to Chicago, and figures that he would save about $40 a month by riding a van pool to Hoffman Estates.
Sears attorney Keith Wilson, who lives in La Grange, said that he expects his commute to increase from a 35-minute train ride to a 90-minute van ride.
To make the longer trip worthwhile, Wilson said that he has volunteered to be a van pool driver. He will get free transportation to and from work as long as he picks up his six passengers and keeps the van`s gas tank filled. Under its van pool program, Pace will own the van and pay for fuel and upkeep. Even so, Wilson added, many co-workers are reluctant to become part-time chauffeurs: ”They`re dying for drivers. No one wants the responsibility.”
The forecast that half of one`s suburban work force would get to work by means other than driving alone ”is very optimistic,” said Joseph Shofer, director of research for the Northwestern University Transportation Center in Evanston.
”It would be a wonderful achievement if they could come reasonably close,” Shofer said, noting that companies elsewhere that have promoted ride- sharing and transit count themselves fortunate to have gotten 10 percent of their employees out of their cars.
If Pace and Sears do succeed later this month in signing up as many riders as they expect, they would have won only half the battle.
”If service does not meet expectations of quality early on, people will decide to pop for that extra car,” Shofer said. ”Once people drop into the automobile habit, it will be very hard to get them back.”
A successful transportation program is crucial if Sears is to keep most of its present employees, many of whom do not own cars. It also is a test of Pace`s Comprehensive Operating Plan, a long-range program to improve suburban transit through new initiatives like subscription buses and van pools.
The Pace plan is a key component of the $5.1 billion Future Agenda for Suburban Transportation, a joint Pace-Metra document also released Monday.
To serve Prairie Stone, located near Illinois Highway 59 and the Northwest Tollway, Pace has budgeted $1.3 million in capital and operating costs for the next two years. Sears would contribute $943,423, of which $760,000 would be a land donation for a Prairie Stone Transit Center, and the balance, operating subsidies.
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Nearly $1.5 million in operating funds would be sought from the Regional Transportation Authority, parent of Pace. Pace and Sears plan to take their proposal to the RTA planning and finance committees in May and the full RTA board in June.
The Sears-Pace transit plan benefits more than just the retailer, said Joseph DiJohn, executive director of Pace: ”To the highway system, it will take 1,500 single-occupancy vehicles off of the road.”
”And it will allow others in that area, such as Northern Illinois University and Ameritech, to use mass transit,” DiJohn said, citing the new NIU classroom center at Prairie Stone and the Ameritech Services office complex to the east.
To carry ”reverse commuters” coming out from Chicago, the plan calls for four fixed-route express bus services with a potential ridership of 325 people.
Buses would stop at CTA rapid transit stations at River Road on the O`Hare line, 54th Avenue on the Douglas line and Desplaines Avenue on the Congress line, and Metra stations in Barrington and Bartlett.
An additional 900 employees are expected to sign up for 20 subscription bus routes, gathering people from such far-flung locations as Naperville, Evanston, Park Forest and Calumet City. More than 300 people would fill at least 25 and possibly as many as 35 van pools.
And Sears` Rule estimated that 1,000 employees could end up car-pooling under a ride-sharing program of the Chicago Area Transportation Study.
Nine of every 10 Sears employees downtown already use public transportation or ride-sharing to get to work, Rule said.
Less successful transit promotions at other companies around the country
”had to go in and actually change people`s habits,” Rule said. ”What we`re trying to do is keep people doing essentially what they are doing now, and that`s a lot easier.”
”With subscription buses and van pools, if you put in a plan before (a company) moves, you have a better chance at converting people to mass transit,” DiJohn said.