Ogilvie Transportation Center
The Richard B. Ogilvie Transportation Center (
History
The 1911 station
The
The Tyler & Hippach Mirror Company Factory was moved 168 feet east and 52 feet south to make room for the station's construction.[3] At the time, this was the largest building ever moved.[4]
The station's 16 tracks were elevated above street level and "reached by six approach tracks and sheltered under an 894-foot-long [272 meter] Bush train shed."[2] The upper level of the head house housed a concourse and other facilities for intercity passengers, including "dressing rooms, baths, nurses and matrons rooms, and a doctor's office".[5] The centerpiece of the upper level was a stately waiting room, measuring 201 by 202 feet (34 by 62 meters), and rising 84 feet (approx. 26 meters) to its barrel vaulted ceiling.[2] In addition to the main concourse on the upper level, there was a street-level concourse for commuters.
During the heyday of rail travel, the Chicago and North Western Terminal was home to the C&NW's trains to
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CNW Terminal c. 1912
-
C&NW train in July 1964
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Interior in 1981
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Terminal in November 1981
The 1984 station
In 1984, the head house was razed and replaced with the glass-and-steel 42-story Citicorp Center (now Accenture Tower), which was completed three years later in 1987. Metra service was maintained with only minor interruptions during construction – following the example of the demolition and replacement of
1991 rehabilitation
In 1991 Metra purchased the train shed from Chicago and North Western and conducted a survey to determine the condition. The examination included necessary repairs to improve its structural integrity and redesign measures to bring the station up to modern mass-commuting standards. After completing a thorough evaluation, Metra, the Urban Mass Transportation Administration, and the Illinois Department of Transportation decided to completely replace the existing structure and in 1992, with the assistance of Federal funding, a contractor and management team were selected to begin the work.
Many engineering challenges had to be addressed and resolved, not only because of the train shed's prominent location but also due to its high traffic volume as it was to remain operational to 45,000 daily commuters during the project. Such challenges included the removal of original lead paint, the complete replacement of all 16 tracks which served 200 trains a day, extensive structural steel repairs (under load), erection of a new steel canopy, complete exterior masonry restoration, new electrical and plumbing systems, and construction of a new pedestrian concourse. During the rehabilitation project, which lasted four years and cost $138 million, over 60 contractors spent more than 800,000 man-hours performing repairs and producing new construction.
The station was renamed the Ogilvie Transportation Center in 1997, two years after the C&NW merged into the Union Pacific Railroad. The station was named for
Platforms and tracks
The station has 16 tracks with eight island platforms, each island platform servicing two tracks. Not all the platforms are the same length; the platforms on the western part of the station (tracks 1–10) are significantly longer than the eastern platforms. In general, West Line trains depart from the western platforms (roughly tracks 1–5), Northwest Line trains depart from the middle tracks (6–10), and North Line trains depart from the eastern tracks (11–15). (Track 16 is seldom used by revenue trains.) This is done so that departing and arriving trains do not have to make large switch movements, which would block the use of other tracks and prevent multiple trains from arriving and departing at the same time. Just north of the station, the number of tracks reduces from 16 to six. Switches allow for trains on any of the 16 station tracks to end up on any of these six tracks, and vice versa. About a third of a mile from the station, the six tracks split into two mainlines of four tracks. One mainline turns west, while the other turns northwest. West Line trains take the west tracks, while Northwest and North Line trains take the northwest tracks. Out-of-service trains use the west mainline to access yards and maintenance facilities.
Services
The Chicago and North Western Terminal has served as a terminal for all the
Metra's three Union Pacific District lines – the Union Pacific North Line, Union Pacific Northwest Line and Union Pacific West Line – now provide regular commuter rail service along three former C&NW lines. In Metra's zone-based fare schedule, Ogilvie is in Zone 1. More than 106,000 people board Metra trains at Ogilvie Transportation Center each day.[1]
Traffic statistics
Rank | Route | Daily passengers (weekday) |
---|---|---|
1 | UP-N
to Kenosha |
41,000 |
2 | 38,600 | |
3 | UP-W
to Elburn |
27,200 |
Bus and 'L' connections
Bus connections can be made on Madison Street or Washington Boulevard via the Citigroup Center or through a lower level concourse accessible by the track platforms between Washington Boulevard and Randolph Street with entrances at Canal and Clinton Streets. Connections can also be made at the Union Station bus terminal via an entrance to Union Station's north concourse on Madison Street.
Ogilvie offers two connections to the
- J14 Jeffery Jump
- 19 United Center Express
- 56 Milwaukee
- 60 Blue Island/26th (Owl Service)
- 120 Ogilvie/Streeterville Express
- 124 Navy Pier
- 125 Water Tower Express
- 126 Jackson
- 128 Soldier Field Express
- 130 Museum Campus
- 157 Streeterville/Taylor
- 192 University of Chicago Hospitals Express
Major intercity trains before Amtrak
- Chicago & North Western trains
- North Western Limited
- Twin Cities 400
- Flambeau 400
- Minnesota 400 and its successors the Dakota 400 and Rochester 400
- Kate Shelley 400
- Union Pacific/Chicago and North Western trains
- Overland Limited
- Challengers
- City of San Francisco
- City of Los Angeles
- City of Portland
- City of Denver
- Gold Coast
See also
- List of busiest railway stations in North America
- List of passenger railroads in Chicagofor other passenger railroad terminals in downtown Chicago
References
- ^ a b "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-12-27. Retrieved 2014-03-08.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ^ OCLC 45908903.
- ^ Rodkin, Dennis. "What’s That Building? The Cassidy Tire Building — And Its Unusual Escape From Demolition", WBEZ. June 6, 2019. Retrieved November 30, 2019.
- ^ "Threatened: Cassidy Tire Building Endangered by New High-Rise Tower Proposal", Preservation Chicago. Retrieved November 30, 2019.
- ^ Maiken, Peter T. (1989). Night Trains. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 166.
- ^ Official Guide of the Railways, National Railway Publication Co, April 1940
- Kevin P. Keefe, City of Six Stations, Trains July 2003, p. 69