By March, a trip to O’Hare International Airport won’t have to mean expensive taxis or long El rides for students returning home.
The Pace board of directors unanimously approved the extension of bus route 250 to the airport at its meeting Wednesday in Arlington Heights.
The route, which now goes from the Davis El station to Des Plaines will be extended in March to the O’Hare Kiss-n-Fly lot, where passengers will be able to connect to a free airport train taking them to terminals.
The ride from Davis to the Kiss-n-Fly will take between 50 minutes and one hour and five minutes and will cost $1.50, Pace officials said.
The new service is part of the North Shore Initiative, a yearlong effort to restructure Pace service in north suburban Chicago. The Pace board approved the initiative, which also includes extending bus route 208 to Schaumburg giving Evanston residents direct access to Illinois’ only IKEA.
The new services will come at the expense of bus routes 204 and 212, which Pace will eliminate. Both of these North Shore routes have suffered from declining ridership, especially the Saturday-only route 204, which transports fewer than 300 passengers a week, Pace officials said. The new services will improve public transportation in the area, said Pace spokesman Blaine Krage.
“It allows us to be more efficient and to better serve the region, offering more direct services where passengers will be transferring less,” Krage said.
The North Shore Initiative was Pace’s first attempt at involving the public in its decision-making process concerning route changes. Throughout the last year, Pace officials have held meetings to gather feedback from riders and to hear new ideas for routes.
“Pace is doing planning all the time, but we thought this time around we’d make an effort to find out what people from the various municipalities thought,” said Vernon Squires, a Pace director representing the North Shore. “We got a lot of input.”
The new O’Hare service came partly as a result of the efforts of Evanston’s Transportation Future. The transit advocacy group lobbied Pace for the new service by participating in the North Shore Citizens Advisory Committee.
“We have a good working relationship with the Pace people,” said Rick Martin, the group’s convener. “It’s an example where citizens can get involved and have an impact and that’s good.”
The group originally urged Pace to operate express buses with luggage racks from Evanston to O’Hare, said Peter Nicholson, a member of Evanston’s Transportation Future.
“While the Pace folks think that’s a good idea it’s something they don’t have the budget to implement right now,” Nicholson said.
Pace directors had Northwestern students in mind when they approved the extension to O’Hare, Squires said, noting that a taxi from Evanston to the airport can cost almost $30.
“If we can get you out there for something less than that, that’s a good thing,” Squires said.
Reach Greg Hafkin at [email protected].
