Revised ideas for renovations of the Chicago Transit Authority and Metra stations on Main Street were introduced for public feedback at a presentation Monday night.
The proposed improvements are part of a Transit Oriented Development Study conducted by Evanston and the Regional Transportation Authority. The city and RTA hope to find ways to make the CTA and Metra stations more accessible to each other and to the surrounding Main Street neighborhood.
The goal of the study is to generate economic development and increase ridership, said Jay Ciavarella, RTA division manager of local planning and programs.
“(Main Street) is an area where there’s some transit dependence with the location of the El and the Metra,” he said. “I’ve seen success in situations like this. We hope Evanston can follow suit.”
Ciavarella said the study group wants feedback from Evanston residents to make sure it is “on the right track” with its preliminary concepts.
However, Monday night’s meeting — the second of three — attracted only several people. Mark Muenzer, Evanston’s director of community development, said he was not worried about the turnout.
“This is an in-between stage of the project rollout,” he said.
Muenzer partly attributed the low attendance to two other city meeting happening at about the same time, as well as the Chicago Bears football game.
In December 2011, the RTA’s Community Planning program granted Evanston $100,000 to hire a consulting team for the study, which the city matched with $25,000. Evanston hired Parsons Brinckerhoff, a firm specializing in infrastructure project consultation, to draw up ideas with the help of Chicago public transportation officials.
Tom Coleman, innovation and technology manager at Parsons Brinckerhoff, reviewed the different concepts the team had devised. The plan that Parsons recommended would cost almost $40 million.
Patricia Simms, an Evanston resident, said that number does not bother her.
“We’re the ones who would benefit from it. Why shouldn’t we pay for it?” she said.
Simms and her husband Herbert Simms have lived in Evanston for more than 25 years and frequently use public transportation. She said it is now time for the Main Street area to be renovated
“I hope this will revitalize the area by making Main Street more exciting,” she said. “It’s becoming a Mecca, and transportation could support that and make it much better.”
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @paigeleskin
