Passenger Trains > Video runthrough of CTA Purple Line

On my commute to work I happened to have camera gear handy and a rear window seat, so I took a nearly complete video of CTA's Purple Line between Howard (northern border of Chicago) and Belmont, where the Red, Purple, and Brown Lines combine. The Purple line runs "express" between those locations, making no stops. In reality, very few segments seem to have the max track speed anymore; for example, on the long straight stretch between Loyola and Wilson the train only goes 55mph on two brief occasions.

I'm attaching two videos: one is the route at regular speed, showing meets and interesting infrastructure, likely the weedy, rough track on near Wilson and the sharp elevated curves at Sheridan.

The second is the entire segment speed up by 1000%



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/23/14 19:03 by inCHI.

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Very cool Jeff. I like how you caught my next project at the very end.

This was even more fun back in the ancient times (in my case 1971) when I visited Chicago to ride CTA, South Shore, and the various commuter lines. One of my traction fan buddies said, "Be sure to ride the Evanston Express." This was back when the last of the 4000-class cars from the 1920s were in service on what is now the Purple Line. They were still using trolley poles between Evanston and Wilmette, and they didn't have those annoying speed monitors.

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kevink Wrote:
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> Very cool Jeff. I like how you caught my next
> project at the very end.

Thanks. At the beginning, there is also a view of the new powerhouse they constructed between Jarvis and Morse. Another project that is visible is the removal of a crossover right after Lawrence.

What is the function of the rail located between the running rails ?
Ground return ?
TIA!
...Lorenzo