Suburban trains, buses and bikeways are in line for sizable chunks of federal funding this spring, and the biggest winner of all is likely to be the proposed Wisconsin Central commuter rail line.
The Work Program Committee of the Chicago Area Transportation Study recommended federal funding to cover nearly half of Metra’s expected startup costs for the Antioch-to-Franklin Park Wisconsin Central service.
There also would be funding for new vehicles and new service at Pace, and for new bicycle paths in seven suburbs and on Chicago’s Far South Side.
The Chicago Transit Authority would get $21.6 million to buy up to 100 new buses. But the transportation study’s program committee turned down a CTA request for $6.7 million in operating funds for the new Southwest Side rapid-transit line.
A CTA spokesman said the action would not affect Chicago’s plans to start running Southwest “L” trains this summer.
The study has been charged with reducing more than $100 million in local highway and transit grant applications to about $51 million, the amount available this year under the federal congestion relief and air quality program.
The study’s Policy Committee is expected to affirm the Work Program Committee’s recommendations Thursday.
Metra will be allowed to apply for $5.7 million this year and was promised a total of $22.7 million over the next three years for the Wisconsin Central. Trains are expected to be running by the summer of 1995.
Metra also could apply for $6.1 million this year for a new station on the Burlington Northern at the North-South Tollway in Downers Grove, service improvements on the Norfolk Southern, and bicycle lockers and other improvements at stations in Grayslake, Oak Forest, Schaumburg and Tinley Park.
Pace could seek $4.2 million to buy 14 fuel-efficient buses, extend service to the CTA Southwest line, and set up transfer facilities in Cicero, Des Plaines, Harvey, Rosemont, Westmont and at Brainard Avenue and the South Shore Line in Chicago.
Also recommended were nearly $1.3 million for bikeways and pedestrian improvements in Country Club Hills, Flossmoor, Itasca, Orland Park, Skokie, Tinley Park and West Chicago, and $2.6 million for a Dan Ryan Woods-Beverly neighborhood bike path in Chicago.
The Transportation Management Associations of Central Lake County, the Lake-Cook Corridor and the Illinois Corridor in Du Page County were OKd for $612,996 in grants for studies on reverse commuting and ride sharing.
The Illinois Department of Transportation would get $2.4 million, mostly for traffic signal interconnections along Arlington Heights Road, Palatine Road and U.S. Highway 12 in the northwest suburbs; Dempster Street in the north suburbs; North Avenue, Ogden Avenue and Roosevelt Road in the near west suburbs, and Western Avenue in the south suburbs.