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Page 6THE WORLD, SUNDAY, APRIL m 1976'cut-outs’ forO P. Ave. 'L’SlateBy CHARLES GIAMETTAIn a move to increase access ramp surveillance, the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) is planning modifications to opaque panels at the Oak Park Avenue Eisenhower line “L station, the WORLD learned Wednesday.The modifications, set to begin in two weeks, will be similar to panel “cut-outs now employed as safety measures at the Austin Avenue “L platform access tunnel. The work is scheduled to take one week.Tom Buck, public real turns officer for the CTA, said the modification plan was initiated very recently as a result of CTA general manager George Brambles' statement concern ing the “urgency of this matter.Brambles, an Oak Park resident who has been pressured by the Oak Park Community Organization (OPCO) to push the installation of clear ramp panels, said in a letter to OPCO dated March 17, that the CTA would be willing to take some type of immediate action to improve visibility into the enclosed ramps.Oak Park village officials, police and community groups have pushed for the installation of clear panels which would open the ramp and tunnel areas to surveillance by the police department, providing safer conditions for the 3,600 commuters walking to and from Oak Park EisenhowerL platforms each day.Panel modification on the Oak Park ramp will entail GO-inch wide cut-outs extending from about three feet off the ramp’s floor to near the roof of the fiberglass enclosure. Consecutive pairs of panels are to receive such windows. with every third panel to remain solid.Buck said the two-week delay in modification work is to allow for the construction of pre-fabricated fiberglass frames which will fit around openings in the corrugated fiberglass walls.Paul Bloyd, co-chairman of OPCO said Wednesday's proposal is “only a very small part of what’s needed.It's a legitimate effort, it’s just not adequate, Bloyd said.Bloyd maintains the CTA has stalled the installation of clear panels on the Lombard Avenue, East Avenue and Oak Park Avenue stations.ft’s almost like it’s, sheer stubbor-ness oil their part,” he said. “There’s a lot of interim measures that could be taken that they haven’t done. It’s a classic example of bureaucracy, they are removed from the people.”It's not that we’re not responsive, Buck said. “To do something elaborate requires money and we simply don’t have the money.”derstand this is one station of major concern, he said.OPCO claims that Terrell Hill, CTA General Development Manager agreed in 1975 to the need for priority consideration, starting at Austin, then working to the Lombard and East Avenue stations.It is estimated the cost of clear panels of tempered glass or unbreakable lexan would be about $325,000. The CTA has budgeted $500,000 in its 1976 Capital Improvement program for modifications” to one station in Oak Park and one in Chicago “to determine the most effective way to improve passenger security.”This modification money is part of a $71 million CTA budget request which has yet to be approved by the Regional Transit Authority (RTA).Wayne Dunham, public information officer for the RTA said the modification money “is certainly not a major part “ of CTA’s budget, but that the CTA could not afford to install clear panels without federal help.The RTA board will decide May 6 what part of the $71 million CTA budget request to submit,to the federal government.“It’s unlikely that the Urban Mass Transportation Administration will approve the entire $71 million total,” Dunham said.Even if the $500,000 modification grant is included in the portion of theCTA request approved by the federal government, revenue for clear panels will not be available until July, Dunham said.The modification proposed Wednes day came out of the CTA’s limited maintenance funds, Buck said.„ Clear panels are seen as one optimum solution to what Oak Park Village President James McClure calls “an important, significant matter for mass transit.“There’s not a great crime problem on (he lines now and we don’t want there to be one,” McClure said.He said clear panels would act as a “preventive” measure adding to a safer “image” for the stations Deputy Chief Harold Fitzsimmons of the Oak Park police said crime on neither the Lake Street nor Eisenhower rapid transit lines is a big problem but that clear panels would “assist tremendously” in the police depart-rampment’s ability to control what crime there exists.Presently, the beat officer will pa trol the ramps and tunnels by period! tally walking through them on his normal patrol.Buck claims that cie.ar panels would have “no definable effect” on the number of riders who would use rapid transit because they felt the panels made boarding and leaving he trains safer.Buck declined to confirm if any work to other ramps or enclosures was planned.We're doing this because we unThis track-level walkway at Oak Park’s Lombard Avenue station will not receive modification because the CTA says it lacks the funds to do so. (Photo by Keith Swinden)D* 17___ 1
Newspaper Details
News Journal
Chicago, Illinois, US
Sun, Apr 18, 1976
Page 29
Full Page
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USA 04 Feb 2025
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