With a major winter storm on the way, Metra will mobilize all the crews and snow-fighting resources at its disposal this weekend to ensure a safe, comfortable and reliable commute for customers throughout its six-county service area.
“Metra has made a variety of improvements that leave us well-prepared for winter’s onslaught, including more and better switch heaters and better jet blowers to clear snow,” said Metra Executive Director/CEO Don Orseno. “We’ve also taken several steps to improve communications with our customers so they can always be up to date with the latest information about their trains.”
Metra will take a variety of steps before and during the storm, including:
Dispatching Metra signal/switch maintainers to key locations and staffing them 24/7. The switches must remain free of snow and ice, and while all mainline switches have heaters to help keep them clear, sometimes the snow and ice falls too fast or falls from a passing train and the switches need to be cleared manually with brooms, shovels or picks.
Dispatching about 350 workers to shovel and salt platforms and other areas that are Metra’s responsibility to clear. Clearing platforms, stations and parking lots is often the responsibility of BNSF, UP, Metra’s parking vendor or the municipality in which the station is located and those entities also are gearing up.
Putting crews and equipment in place to keep our 24 rail yards clear and operational. Bottlenecks in yards can result in delays getting trains in place for timely departures. Metra uses high-powered hot-air jet blowers and cold-air blowers in the yards to clear the snow and prevent blowing and drifting. In the last two years, Metra has also installed heaters on more than 40 of our most critical yard switches.
Fueling our locomotives in outlying rail yards overnight. Fueling is normally done as part of the midday servicing routine. But, because the locomotives must be disconnected from their cars to be fueled, fueling them during winter storm conditions can take longer and cause yard congestion and train delays. We’ll fuel them Sunday night to help with operations Monday.
Leaving our engines on overnight. Locomotives don’t like the cold any more than we do. If it’s too cold we may keep the engines on so they are ready when we need them.
Running extra “ice trains” overnight on the Metra Electric Line. We must prevent ice from accumulating on the overhead power lines so the Highliner cars can continue to draw power to operate. During major storms, we may run these extra trains around the clock to ensure that the Metra Electric Line remains operational.
Equipment and materials
Metra will begin this winter with 63,000 bags or more than 3.1 million pounds of salt to cover the platforms and other areas under its responsibility.
Metra has about 45 snow plows/blowers at its disposal, not counting the equipment used by its parking vendor and the numerous municipalities responsible for clearing parking lots and other areas around most of its suburban stations.
Metra has five hot-air jet blowers and three cold-air blowers to clear its largest and most critical yards. The truck-mounted cold-air blowers clear ice and snow with a 525 mph blast. Capable of traveling over roads or rails, this versatile tool can quickly clear significant amounts of snow.
Customer communications
Metra understands the importance of providing reliable, real-time communications to help our customers make decisions about their travel options during severe weather and offers a number of tools to give them access to the most up-to-date service information.
Email alerts – Customers can sign up to receive service alerts via email for a specific rail line during the times of day that are most important to them. Visit metrarail.com and click on “Sign Up” to create an account and choose your alerts.
Ventra App – Customers can download the app and use the Transit Tracker for information about Metra trains, Pace buses and CTA trains and buses. The free app is available in the App Store or Google Play.
Rail-Time Tracker – Customers can visit metrarail.com and access real-time information about train status and service alerts. This information is also reflected in the Schedule Finder tool, which allows you to generate a schedule between two stops on a line for a specific day.
Twitter – Customers can visit www.twitter.com to follow each of Metra’s 11 rail lines or receive more general information about agency operations.
Passenger Services – Customers can call 312-322-6777 weekdays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. with questions about train schedules and service. On evenings and weekends, call the RTA Travel Information Center at 312-836-7000. Calls are answered from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. every day.
Tips for traveling on Metra during winter weather:
Give yourself plenty of time to travel to the station and park. Expect delays. More customers are likely to use Metra trains when the weather is severe. The addition of just 10 more people on each train can increase boarding time and cause trains to fall behind schedule.
Visit the National Weather Service website for the latest weather and storm-related information.
Watch local television and listen to local radio stations for Metra travel and service updates.
Use caution when walking on wet or icy station platforms.
If you are already traveling, listen for announcements at stations and onboard trains.