Metra’s Ravenswood Station to get major upgrade

February 14, 2001 Metra and Alderman Gene Schulter (47th) are pleased to announce that Metra is ready to move forward with building a bigger and better Ravenswood Station at its current location on the Union Pacific North Line. The station overhaul is part of a major $185-million project to replace 22 bridges on the line.

The new station will offer
longer, covered platforms, warming shelters, improved lighting, landscaping, a
ticket office, vendor space, ramps and stairs. It will be compliant with the
Americans with Disabilities Act.

The project to rebuild the
22 aging bridges on the north side of Chicago between Fullerton and Balmoral
was announced last month. As part of that announcement, Metra said the project
would include a new Ravenswood Station, but it did not finalize the precise
location until recently.

The location was determined
after considerable consultation with Ald. Schulter and the affected community.
Ald. Schulter coordinated community meetings to keep the residents of
Ravenswood informed about the plans for this project.  In addition, he and Metra met individually with residents to
discuss specific concerns. As a result of these meetings, it was decided that
the redevelopment of the current platforms into a full Metra station best met
the needs of the neighborhood.

The first phase of the
bridge construction project includes 11 bridges between Grace and Balmoral. The
plan calls for closing the west (outbound) track and rebuilding the west half
of each bridge while the east (inbound) track handles both inbound and outbound
trains. After the west bridges are complete in 2012, all traffic will switch to
the new west track while the east track is closed and the east half of each
bridge is rebuilt. That work will be finished in 2014. 

Construction of the new
Ravenswood Station, the only stop in the construction zone and the busiest stop
on the line, will begin later this year or early next year. Because the
existing station cannot be used while it is being rebuilt, a temporary boarding
platform is being constructed just north of Lawrence. The temporary platform
will be used by both inbound and outbound passengers, since the UP North Line
is being reduced to a single track in the construction zone.

The work on the new station
will concentrate on the west platform during the first two years, so that
platform will be ready for use when trains switch to the new west bridges in
2012. From 2012 to 2014, inbound and outbound passengers will share the new
west platform until work on the east bridges is completed in 2014. Work will
then shift to the 11 remaining bridges to the south, between Fullerton and
Cornelia. That work will take another four years, until 2018, and will also
require UP North trains to use a single track in that stretch.