Description:

Northwestern University Transportation Center & NUTC's Sandhouse Rail Group present:

"A Tale of Two Stations:  Construction challenges associated with the new CTA Wilson and 95th street stations"

Chris Bushell
Chief Infrastructure Officer,  Chicago Transit Authority

CTA’s Red Ahead program — a comprehensive initiative for maintaining, modernizing, and expanding Chicago’s most-traveled rail line — includes two large-scale and challenging capital projects at each end of the route. The unique and complex construction challenges associated with two of the program’s projects, the new CTA Wilson and 95th street stations, will be explored.

At the north end, the $203 million Wilson Station Reconstruction Project is modernizing a 94-year-old stationhouse and about a quarter-mile of more than 100-year-old track structure. The project includes about 2,200 feet of elevated tracks, signals and supporting infrastructure, engineering a long clear-span of Broadway at a severe angle, and maintaining service on a four-track line and busy rail station throughout the project. When the project is complete later this year, riders will have a modern, spacious and ADA-accessible station that will be a new transfer point for Red and Purple Line Express trains.

Meanwhile, at the south end of the Red Line, the $280 million 95th Street Terminal Improvement Project is one of the largest station reconstructions in CTA’s history, creating a signature station featuring a modern design and myriad customer amenities. The project reconstructs the existing station and bus terminal, while building a second stationhouse and bus terminal across 95th St, linked by an overhead pedestrian bridge and at platform level. This work must be completed not only without unduly affecting Red Line service (including access to the train yard beyond the station), and within the constraints of the expressway median where the line is located, but also over the lanes of one of Chicago’s busiest freeways.

The presentation will focus on the basic logistics of building major stations, as well as the particular challenges of these projects, while still providing adjacent rail service and how these logistics impact cost and schedule.

Speaker Bio:
Christopher Bushell, Chicago Transit Authority, Chief Infrastructure Officer/Senior Vice President is a graduate of the University of Michigan where he received his Masters Degree in Architecture. Chris' career prior to CTA included design and construction management as a consultant to the Chicago Public Schools and later as the Director of Capital Renovations in the Chicago Public School's Department of Operations. In May 2004 Chris was appointed as the First Deputy Executive Director for the City of Chicago's Department of Construction and Permits. Since 2007 Chris has overseen the maintenance, construction, and engineering related to the CTA's rail infrastructure.