Quote:
Originally Posted by CTA Gray Line
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/l...,1515271.story
By Richard Wronski, Tribune reporter
March 16, 2014
One month into his chairmanship of Metra, Martin Oberman, a longtime Chicago Democrat, ventured into DuPage County, historically a suburban Republican bastion.
Few turf fights in Illinois' political wars have been more us-vs.-them than mass transit. Traditionally, Chicago Democrats have protected the CTA, while suburban
Republicans have jealously guarded Metra and Pace.......
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Oberman needs to cut the shit with this political stuff. Guess what Oberman: both Republicans and Democrats ride METRA and neither care who is to blame politically, they just both look to you now to fix it. I am rooting for you to succeed, because Chicagoland needs METRA to work properly, but he should be running it as an a-political organization, rather than advertising it as the reverse.
Oberman mentioned later in the article, ""But I don't sense even in the Republican suburbs that people are unwilling to pay for the right service." Okay....thanks for that insight Captain Obvious.
And in earlier interviews mentioned something about "rich Republican friends in the western suburbs (DuPage) complaining about train horns bothering their horses." So much for non-partisan?
Yet he says, "This isn't partisan......." oh really? You sure make it seem like that...
Oberman says, "but the biggest enlightenment (for me) was the sheer complexity of the system. It just never occurred to me, and I bet it hasn't occurred to most of the people who ride the trains every day either."
No, it doesn't occur to me because it isn't my f'ing just to ponder the complexities of METRA, it is your job.
DuPage/Western suburbs have the HIGHEST METRA ridership in the entire system, so how about making the trains run on-time, improve customer service (most METRA conductors are GREAT, some are real shit-heads), scrap visionary projects like the STAR line and instead run a train line down/near 294 from O'Hare to Midway, and improve Union Station to Ogilvie/Millennium Station standards.
Sorry for the rant, but it doesn't seem like he's getting off on the right foot here with this suburb (Republican) vs City (Democrat) stuff.