Downtown Chicago Metra stations to add platforms for expected uptick in South Shore traffic

Expecting to run more trains to downtown Chicago in about two years, the South Shore Line plans to add a platform at each station there.

The South Shore Line will work on the project at the Millennium and Van Buren Street stations with Metra, the Chicago-area commuter rail line that owns the stations.

“At the end of the day, it’s a great project for both Metra and NICTD,” South Shore Line President Michael Noland told the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District board Monday. NICTD owns the South Shore Line.

The South Shore Line operates on four Metra tracks in Chicago, Noland said, but only has three now at Millennium and Van Buren. Storage tracks will be converted to operating tracks there to enable more trains to use the stations.

The South Shore Line will borrow $!50 million through a bond issue for the project, Noland said.

The railroad needs more station capacity at the downtown Chicago stations, he said, because it plans to add 26 trains to its daily schedule when both the West Lake Corridor and Double Track projects, now under construction, are completed about two years from now.

The NICTD board Monday selected Lakeshore Engineering, of Chicago, to oversee the project for NICTD through 2025, for about $1.23 million.

Metra will do most of the work, Noland said, but NICTD wants to have “our own eyes and ears on the project.”

Speaking of the railroad’s current projects, Noland said Double Track — a second set of tracks between Gary and Michigan City, and new Miller and Michigan City stations — is more than 50 percent complete.

Construction is on schedule to be completed in November. Testing of the new tracks and systems, including positive train control, will continue until next spring, and Noland expects trains to be running there on a new schedule around May 2024.

“We thank our customers, our riders, for being participants in this process,” he said.

He said West Lake Corridor project, a new rail line from Hammond to the Munster/Dyer border, is about 25 percent complete, with complications including plans to cross a major national railroad in two locations.

West Lake is still scheduled to begin service in May 2025, Noland said.

The railroad’s management and NICTD board had to deal with a contract issue Monday.

Noland told the NICTD board that the railroad has been under an April 1 deadline to update its positive train control, a computer-run backup train operating system.

However, he said, Parsons Engineering Group, the company that had been under contract since 2015 to set up and update the system, told the railroad it wasn’t able to complete the latest update.

“In our opinion,” Noland said, “Parsons did not live up to their obligation.”

The railroad then turned to Wabtech Corp., of Pittsburgh, a Parsons subcontractor, and Wabtech completed the upgrade for $865,000, so the railroad could meet its April 1 deadline.

“First and foremost, we’re going to service our riders,” Noland said.

The NICTD board ratified the contract with Wabtech and asked its attorney, Charles Lukmann, to seek to recover the Wabtech contract’s cost from Parsons.

Board member James Arnold said he hoped the issue wouldn’t wind up in a lawsuit.

Tim Zorn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.