Standing on a second-story Bronzeville balcony Sunday evening, a couple watched from above as the grassy area between their apartment building and the CTA Green Line tracks came to life in a way it never had before.
They saw people of all ages come flocking in costumes: one dressed as an inflatable dinosaur and others as bananas, Michael Jackson and a gingerbread girl. Looking down at the gathering of around 30, they could see smaller groups of people forming, as if they were organizing themselves for a task greater than flaunting unusual wardrobes.
“What in God’s name are you doing?” one of the onlookers shouted.
“We’re chasing the train,” the man dressed as Michael Jackson yelled back.
And so the race began.
It’s been a little over two months since 25-year-old Charlie Clerk perfected his social media bit: summoning swarms of costume-clad Chicagoans to run absurd lengths from outside CTA stations toward arriving “L” trains. This spring, the demand for his comedic content skyrocketed, drawing nearly 350,000 followers and video view counts in the millions on his Instagram account, @sidequesttre.
Known by viewers and fellow video participants as “Tre,” Clerk said he works tirelessly to choreograph the perfect train chases. So far, his most viral video had more that 70 million views and showed him — dressed as the Grinch and accompanied by his trademark orange dinosaur — chasing down a train at the Orange Line’s Halsted station.
Online, his videos look chaotic, but behind the scenes, the project’s ringleader spends his free time poring over satellite maps, visiting potential chase sites and crafting the necessary recording angles. Not to mention purchasing an ever-growing number of costumes for those who run with him.
But once he gathers his cast of companions for any given video, he believes preserving authenticity is essential.
“I tell them the vision, I tell them where I want them to be, and then I just leave it at that,” Clerk said. “I don’t want anyone to ever be overly prepared for what’s about to happen.”
As a lifelong public transit rider, Clerk is no stranger to the age-old dilemma his account satirizes: being late for the train. In fact, before his videos claimed consistent virality, many of his posts showed him unironically chasing after buses in regular clothes around the city.
Clerk, who lives in Bronzeville, said he always had family ties to Chicago even though he grew up in New Orleans. He hopes his videos bring attention to the benefits of using public transportation to get around and meet new people.
“A lot of places have transit and even more places don’t, but it’s just so unexplored,” Clerk said. “It’s such a community of individuals that doesn’t need translation.”
At Clerk’s chases, which he has branded as Catch That Train, 23-year-old Brooklyn Roper can almost always be found in the same costume. A longtime roller skater and content creator, Roper is known by her fellow adventure-seekers as “Banana,” a nickname she acquired by wearing the full-body, bright yellow costume she sports in most videos.
When Clerk arrived for Sunday’s chase at the Green Line’s Indiana and 43rd stops, he introduced himself, handed everyone who had gathered pieces of pool noodles, then walked over to Roper and hugged her.
Roper first joined the crew back in April, when she quickly learned the art of running up flights of train station stairs on wheels. Now, she is part of a small group chat of Clerk’s “regular runners,” participating in chases that aren’t advertised online to the public.
Though she admits racing for trains is somewhat of “an adrenaline thing,” she said the best part of Catch That Train has been the tight-knit community she’s found because of it.
“It feels like a super group,” Roper said. “We’re like the Avengers, we just pop up together and show out every single time.”
Clerk promoted Sunday’s chase online, inviting any of his followers to come out and run, wearing FIFA World Cup-related costumes. As his profile has grown, he said it’s important to find stations that are more accessible for large groups and slower runners.
Before each chase begins, Clerk tries to establish a rapport with the CTA employees on-site. Most times, he and the other runners “pre-tap” to pay their fare, allowing them to keep the handicap door open for an extended period of time. Sometimes, he said, the group “runs into issues” with CTA operators who are skeptical of the chaos, but for the most part, the employees he’s met have been supportive.
“You can’t really stop us from running to catch the train like everyone else in the world,” he said.
Out of respect for other riders and with the safety of his fellow runners in mind, Clerk said he often picks stops off the Green and Pink lines — where there is less traffic and more space to run — for his larger chases. The CTA did not respond to a request for comment.
Beneath the Green Line station on Sunday, Clerk separated the larger group into smaller clusters based on aesthetics and ability, then approached each of them to describe their unique role. Toward the front of the pack closest to the station, a group of children joined in on the festivities, and some of the more seasoned train chasers started to dance with them.
For Walt Verdun, the 23-year-old man dressed as Michael Jackson, these moments before and after train chases are often the most memorable.
“I love being around people who just want to enjoy life and be free,” he said. “We’re not talking about anything negative, we’re not doing anything negative, we’re just really bringing the community together.”
Verdun joined the squad of regular runners when Clerk posted online a few months ago, hoping to find as many Michael Jackson impersonators as possible to chase a train with him. No one else showed up, but for Verdun, the opportunity was the start of something deeply transformative.
“I don’t really have friends at all, (I’m) by myself a lot,” he said. “And I really feel like these guys are my true friends now.”
Like Verdun, 37-year-old Terrisa Scott, who wears her own gingerbread girl costume during chases, has relished the chance to step outside her comfort zone. When creating videos, Scott said, even the “OG runners” call each other by their costume names, rather than their real ones.
For her, being able to join the train-chasing community has served as the perfect opportunity to step outside her job in the pathology department at Northwestern Memorial Hospital.
“If work is stressful, that’s fine,” Scott said. “I know I have to go out later and catch the train.”
What began as a small-scale social media project that allowed Clerk’s followers to join in has quickly grown into something bigger. They’ve increasingly demanded him to expand his videos to other cities, he said, prompting him to take solo trips to New York and Philadelphia earlier this spring to chase trains there.
Between the travel, costumes and other expenses, he said maintaining his account has become expensive and time-consuming around his 9-to-5 job in healthcare administration.
Despite the added stress, Clerk said there is one thing that will always make his efforts worth it: the responses he’s received from those watching his videos. Over the last few months, he said he’s heard from parents of children with autism who love his videos, and also from those experiencing tough times who feel uplifted by his posts.
Clerk said these messages are particularly meaningful to him after he lost his 18-year-old brother, Corey Adams, who died in a Tennessee shooting last summer.
“I know how hard it is for me to smile, or for me to shake myself out of those bad situations,” Clerk said. “And for somebody who may be experiencing something similar to me and feel strong enough or passionately enough to reach out and let me know, that’s worth more than any $5 contribution.”
