Greater Cleveland RTA said it has restored all service on its Blue and Green lines that had been suspended for the past eight weeks due to track construction.
The track work took place between the Buckeye-Woodhill Station and Shaker Square.
The project involved replacing 7,000 ties, 29,600 e-clip fasteners, 54,800 spikes, 27,400 feet of rail and 12 turnouts.
The agency spent $8 million on the work and said that last time this segment of the track had been repaired was in the early 1980s.
Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority has awarded a rail grinding contract to Advanced Rail Management.
The contractor will provide rail grinding project management designed to improve wheel/rail interaction on 38 track-miles on the Red Line and 10 track-miles on the Blue and Green lines.
In a news release, ARM said it will provide project management and be responsible for the quality, technical accuracy and coordination of all required services through 2023.
The work undertaken by ARM will include optical rail measurement to capture rail profile, and to measure rail wear prior to the grinding and post-grind optical rail measurement, to assess the effectiveness of the grinding work.
Annual measurement will enable ARM to monitor wear rates over the course of the program.
The Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority is eyeing a standardized type of light-rail car for use on all rail lines of its network.
The move, which was reported by rail passenger advocacy group All Aboard Ohio on its website, is part of a request for proposals for replacement cars.
Cleveland RTA is looking to spend $350 million to buy 40 to 45 cars to replace its aging fleet, a process that is expected to be done in two phases.
Currently, RTA uses cars built by Tokyu on the Red Line between East Cleveland and Cleveland Hopkins Airport via downtown.
Those cars, which were delivered in 1984-1985 would be replaced first because they have substantially deteriorated.
The Green, Blue and Waterfront lines use cars built by Breda that were delivered in 1980-81.
Although those cars are older, they have held up better than the Red Line cars.
RTA is reportedly seeking a type of car that serves both low and high-level platforms.
The Red Line has high-level platforms whereas all other rail lines have low-level platforms.
Stations at East 34th, East 55th and Tower City have both types of platforms.
Americans With Disabilities Act standards require transit platforms to be the same height or within 2 inches of a train car’s floor. Rail car doorways must be no farther than 4 inches from the edge of the platform.
This means whatever type of car RTA buys must be adaptable in use to varying platform heights or all of the agency’s station platforms must be modified to be a uniform height.
The two types of rail cars used by RTA have different specifications for floor height and doorway width.
There are transit rail cars in use today in the United States that are capable of adapting to varying platform sizes.
AAO’s report, which cited unnamed RTA officials, said it isn’t clear if the agency will move to standardize platform dimensions or seek rail cars that can adapt to platforms of varying heights.
The report said RTA’s may make that decision based on the responses it gets from its request for proposals. Cost may be the deciding issue.
One advantage of a standardized rail car fleet would be the ability to run direct service from the Blue and Green lines to Hopkins Airport.
Currently, passengers originating on the Blue or Green lines must change cars at either 55th Street or Tower City to get to Hopkins.
It is the day after a winter storm in February 2011 that dumped heavy snow and left trees coated with ice in Cleveland.
The sun is out and I’ve grabbed my camera and gone out to get some photographs.
I drove over to the Warrensville Road Rapid station at the intersection of Warrrensville Road and Shaker Boulevard. The situation is ideal for photographing Cleveland RTA cars.
Shown is an eastbound car bound for the end of the line at Green Road. Years later I’m glad I make the effort to get out and make some photographs on this day. I also wish I had done it more often than I did.
By the time I moved to Cleveland in August 1993 the yellow PCC cars used on the Shaker Rapid Transit lines were long gone, having been replaced by Breda cars built by an Italian manufacturer.
Also long gone by then was Higbee’s and the Silver Grille, and Hallee’s and Mr. Jingeling, all of them venerable Cleveland traditions referenced in the post above of a Shaker Heights PCC car photographed by Robert Farkas.
Seeing Bob’s photo reminded me of how I used to think it was a thrill to ride the Rapid.
Riding the Rapid and passing the high-rise apartment buildings near Shaker Square that can be seen behind the PCC car in Bob’s photograph both made me feel like I lived in a “big city.”
Sure I had lived in Indianapolis for a few years in the late 1980s and early 1990s but it didn’t and still doesn’t have a light rail line. All of the other places I’ve lived were too small to have such a mode of transportation.
None of them had a row of high-rise apartment buildings either.
The town where I grew up didn’t even have public transportation. You either walked or drove everywhere.
Bob’s photo also reminded me of how much I didn’t photograph the Cleveland RTA rail lines during my time living there.
The closest I came to photographing a Rapid car passing those high-rise apartment buildings was getting a car chartered by the Akron Railroad Club passing the Coventry Station during a photo runby.
Coventry station is located at the far east end of that line of apartment buildings that has an “urban” feeling.
Even if there wasn’t a pandemic doing on, I doubt that many people would be riding the Rapid to downtown Cleveland for Black Friday.
If they are going to get out on Black Friday they will drive to their favorite big box store that is more than likely located somewhere in a suburb.
If they have lunch that day it will probably be from a fast food chain outlet.
People continue to ride the Rapid to downtown Cleveland although they are far less likely to do it on Black Friday to go shopping.
Downtown department stores are a thing of the past and the retail that is left is a shadow of what it used to be.
I even wondered if the day after Thanksgiving was known as Black Friday back in the era when Bob made his photograph.
The day after Thanksgiving has been regarded as the start of the U.S. Christmas shopping season since 1952 with the “Black Friday” term dating to at least 1961.
However, one of the earliest known uses of the term in advertising didn’t occur until 1975. Even a decade later the term wasn’ that commonly used by merchants.
But the term has gained widespread currency in more recent decades and has been expanded to refer to marketing efforts that transcend the day after Thanksgiving. There are even “Black Friday” sales in October.
In writing the article that accompanies Bob’s photograph I was trying to capture a holiday tradition even if might be a greatly diminished one.
Some day there will no longer be people around who remember riding the Rapid to downtown to visit Higbee’s or Hallee’s.
There will be others, though, who can associate riding the Rapid to go downtown for other traditions.
A track work project will result in buses replacing trains on the Blue and Green lines starting June 28.
Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority officials said rail replacement is being undertaken between East 55th Street and Woodhill on a section of track used by both routes.
The work is expected to last through Aug. 8.
During the interim, A 67R bus route will serve stations on both lines between Tower City in downtown Cleveland and Van Aken Boulevard (Blue Line) and Green Road (Green Line).
The 67R bus route will not make stops at the train stations at East 55th Street or the Campus District station.
Riders wishing to get off at those stations are being directed to ride Red Line trains.
The 67R buses will make additional stops at Woodland-East 55th Street and Woodland-East 79th Street. The Tower City stop will be on West Huron at West 3rd Street.
Orange 67R bus signs will be place at bus stops. During the track work project 67R buses will be fare free.
Waterfront Line rail service will operate every 30 minutes during this shutdown.
RTA said regular Green and Blue line service is expected to resume at the start of the service day on Aug. 9.
The transit agency also said it has posted new schedules for several routes due to summer service change that take effect on June 28.
In an related matter, Cleveland RTA’s board of trustees has spurned a call by Clevelanders for Public Transit to divert some funds from the agency’s police budget toward increased service and fare reductions.
The advocacy group also demanded that RTA stop having its police officers engage in fare enforcement.
In a statement, the trustees said RTA police engage in many activities other than fare enforcement, including seeking to prevent robberies and assaults.
Thus far in 2020, RTA police have cited 50 people for fare evasion and cited 119 in 2019 and 259 in 2018.
The statement also noted that crime at RTA properties has fallen 65 percent between 2012 and 2019.
RTA police have received de-escalation and racial bias/sensitivity training and officers have been restricted in using choke holds when using force to subdue or detain suspects.
Board President Dennis Clough said during a Tuesday trustees meeting that trustees have asked RTA to provide more data about the services transit police provide, but the board is not interested “in diminishing the safety of our riders or all the other jobs that our police department does.”
Clough said the board would consider using civilian staff for fare enforcement if the RTA administration recommends it.
During a public comment session of the meeting, 10 speakers said addressed the board via online connections on the matter with one person saying or so people during a public comment period at Tuesday morning’s board meeting, conducted remotely with the public able to watch via Facebook and submit questions or comments online.
One commented that law enforcement efforts “tend to systematically target and harass Black riders.”
RTA Police Chief John P. Joyce said RTA recently updated its policy in regards to use of force by officers and the force will expedite a planned purchase of body-worn cameras from 2021 to “as soon as possible.”
At one time rapid transit cars on what is today’s Green Line of Greater Cleveland RTA turned at Green Road in Shaker Heights on this loop.
Now that’s no longer the case. Green Line cars now move east of the station platform a short distance and switch tracks. It is a back and forth move, not a turning move.
But turning was the norm when this former Shaker Heights Rapid Transit PCC was photographed rounding the the turn back loop in the late 1960s or early 1970s.
Greater Cleveland RTA said buses will replace trains on Aug. 17 and 17 on the Blue and Green lines east of Tower
City due to construction work on the East 116th Street bridge.
The 67R buses will not serve the Tri-C- Campus District or E. 55th stations, which will continue to be served by Red Line trains.
In a service advisory, RTA said the stop for Tower City is on West Prospect at West 3rd Street.
There is also a 67R stop at Woodland-East 55th and Woodland-East 79th.
The 67R buses will stop at all other stations on the Blue and Green Lines at the special orange 67R bus stop signs.
Work got underway this week to repair the signal system on the Blue and Green lines of the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority.
Trains may face minor delays during the course of the project, which is expected to take three to four months to complete.
The signal upgrading is part of a $47 million rehabilitation project. Earlier this month, the agency replaced 7,300 ties and rebuilt some track structure on Red Line.
The Blue and Green lines have 30 miles of one-way track that serve 34 stations.
Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority has begun construction of a renovated East 116th-St. Luke’s station on its joint Blue and Green lines in Cleveland.
The $7.2 million project will provide enhanced security features, emergency call buttons and better lighting, and ramps that comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act standards. Construction.
The project is expected to be completed in May 2019. The station was last renovated in 1981.
Shirmir Construction has installed a temporary access way so riders can use the station during construction. Panzica Construction Co. is the general contractor, while City Architecture is providing the design.
The East 116th Station opened in 1920, when service began from Shaker Square to East 34th Street and downtown Cleveland.
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