It is placed plainly for all to see on a wall in the Washington Street station in the CTA’s Dearborn subway.
Posted between the sign that says “Please Do Not Lean over Edge of Platform” and the one that warns, “DANGER, All Persons Are Prohibited from Entering Upon or Crossing the Tracks,” this declaration is short, simple and direct: “No Smoking.”
On a recent visit to the Dearborn tube, I didn’t see any evidence of perilous platform-leaning or treacherous track-walking. But smoking was an altogether different matter.
There was the old man who shuffled by puffing on a pipe, the fellow in the green camouflage cap, smoking as he talked to a friend who inhaled so deeply from his own unfiltered cigarette that you wondered whether it contained tobacco or something more exotic.
Then there was the guy who exited a train that pulled into the station, lighting up immediately as he hit the platform.
As I walked south through the subway, I discovered a shortage of neither no-smoking signs nor discarded butts.
In other words, if this is a no-puffing zone, Mogadishu is a getaway resort.
“Usually, if there are more than five or six people standing on the platform, at least one is smoking,” said Ed McNamara, a CTA rider who quit cigarettes three years ago and has no desire to resume the habit second-hand.
“It’s an odd tyranny, because it is a minority that smokes.”
Though he contends he’s no anti-tobacco zealot and doesn’t have a problem with people who light up in open-air stations, McNamara thinks that smoking shouldn’t be tolerated at enclosed subway stops.
“I usually wander from one end of the platform to the other looking for some clean air, and it is fruitless,” he said.
Sometimes, McNamara said, he’ll point to a sign and tell people that smoking here is prohibited. Some ignore him, but others dutifully snuff out their cigarettes, he said.
All of which makes you wonder about the CTA’s position. If smoking is banned, why is it tolerated? And why are signs posted in the Dearborn subway but not in the State Street subway or the tunnels connecting the two tubes.
If smoking is not prohibited, why are there signs in the Dearborn tunnel? And why doesn’t the CTA at least provide ashtrays so people don’t flip their butts on the tracks and platform?
Agency officials have told McNamara that CTA lawyers don’t believe the city’s anti-smoking ordinance applies because a subway is considered a corridor. But why doesn’t the transit authority ban puffing as a matter of policy?
One senior agency executive, who asked to remain unidentified, provided the answer. In short, he said, the CTA has more pressing things to worry about than enforcement of a tobacco ban.
“What it comes down to is use of the police down there,” he said. Do you want them to battle the bad guys, he asked, or “do you want them to enforce no smoking?”
But McNamara and other riders who don’t like to endure other people’s smoke aren’t asking for an hourly dragnet.
A public awareness effort by the CTA, including periodic announcements that smoking isn’t permitted, would be nice. And when a cop in the subway sees someone smoking, a simple request to snuff doesn’t seem too much to ask.
Metra has smoking restrictions in all of its downtown terminals and virtually all of its outlying stations. This doesn’t prevent violations, but at least ticket agents who receive complaints are authorized to make “tactful announcements” about the prohibition, an agency spokeswoman said.
And though tobacco patrol isn’t a major activity of Metra police officers, they help enforce the ban if called upon, she said.
Seems like a rational approach to us.
– – –
If smoking in the subways is offensive to most riders, doing it on enclosed rail cars is far worse.
Chicago comedian Aaron Freeman suggests a cure for perpetrators.
“Take them to a Smoke-or-Die car,” he writes in Transit Times, a new publication aimed at CTA riders. “Make them puff continuously until they reach their stop. Then open the door just long enough for them to get one clean breath and haul ’em back in for another round trip.
“Though cruel to the smoker, this car will provide ceaseless entertainment for other passengers.”
– – –
The Pace suburban bus system is scheduled to make special curb-to-curb “para-transit” service available starting Monday in much of McHenry County.
As required under the Americans with Disabilities Act, Pace will make the special on-call service, using vehicles equipped with wheelchair lifts, available within three-fourths of a mile of regular, fixed Pace bus routes in Algonquin, Crystal Lake, Fox Lake, Harvard, Johnsburg, Lake in the Hills, McHenry, Wonder Lake and Woodstock.
Days and hours of operation will coincide with those of fixed-route service in those areas. A Pace or CTA Special Services Card is required of special service patrons. Pace also will continue operating Dial-a-Ride service for the general public in many areas of McHenry County.
To obtain a brochure about the new Pace McHenry County ADA Special Services, contact the Pace Passenger Services Office, 708-364-7223, ext. 500.
– – –
Rolling Meadows has applied for state money to complete improvements on Kirchoff Road from Illinois Highway 53 to Wilke Road.
“We’ve been doing the project in bits and pieces, and we are hoping to get state money to finish it,” said city manager Bob Beezat.
The city is seeking about $300,000, he said. Rolling Meadows has been working with business owners along Kirchoff Road on the project in hopes the street reconstruction will make more attractive and unify the city’s shopping district.
Initially, the project was divided into four segments, three of which have been completed, Beezat said. The project has been in the works for four years.
The Pace suburban bus system is scheduled to start curb-to-curb “paratransit” service on Monday in much of Lake County.
As required under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the special on-call service, using vehicles equipped with wheelchair lifts, will be available within three-fourths of a mile of a regular, fixed Pace bus route in four areas of the county: North Lake, Northeast Lake, Northwest Lake and Central Lake.
The territory extends from Zion to Vernon Hills, and from Waukegan to Fox Lake.
A fifth area, southeast Lake County, is scheduled to get the special service in April. Days and hours of operations will coincide with those of fixed-route services in a given corridor.
Existing Dial-a-Ride services for senior services and disabled persons will continue to operate throughout Lake County.
Details of the new Pace Lake County ADA Special Services, including maps and telephone numbers for scheduling rides, can be obtained by contacting the Pace Passenger Services Office, 708-364-7223, ext. 500.
– – –
Planners and engineers from the Illinois Department of Transportation will have to go back to the drawing board to correct safety problems at the accident-plagued intersection of U.S. Highway 41 and Buckley Road.
IDOT had proposed to build a bypass several hundred yards west of the current intersection and had acquired land south of Buckley Road for that purpose some 20 years ago. To complete the project, however, it would have needed additional land north of Buckley-land owned by Abbott Laboratories. When Abbott announced plans for a new complex on that property a few months ago, it put an end to IDOT hopes for acquiring it.
Ironically, North Chicago had been trying for three years to persuade IDOT to give up the bypass idea, with no success. City officials argued that the bypass was unnecessary and that the land south of Buckley would be better used for a commercial development that would boost the city’s tax revenues.
IDOT turned a deaf ear to the city’s pleas and it took pharmaceutical giant Abbott to put an end to the debate.
Former IDOT official Cesar Nepomuceno once compared the Buckley/Highway 41 intersection to the notorious Clavey Road intersection, the site of numerous accidents a few years ago. Nepomuceno said he felt the Buckley problems could not be corrected by simply changing the turn lane and signal patterns, but that’s exactly the solution engineers are examining now.
Whatever IDOT chooses to do, the sooner the better, noted Jeff Meyer, North Chicago’s director of community development. Traffic at the intersection increased by about 500 cars a day in November with the opening of a new restaurant, and Abbott’s expansion continues to contribute to traffic.
———-
Got a commuting question? See a problem on the area’s roads, trains or buses? Getting Around will address topics of general interest. Write to Getting Around, c/o Chicago Tribune, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, Ill. 60611.
