The Daily Parker

I woke up at my usual time this morning, noticed how dark it was, checked radar, and got Cassie out the door less than 10 minutes later. Because by the time I had her to day camp and got myself to the Metra platform, it looked like this:

Waiting for the train, I got this:

But what luck, it let up just as the train arrived. The photo doesn't do it justice: those are horizontal rain bands, and I was standing behind a window.

By the time I got down to Ogilvie, we had this:

Again, just a bit of light rain as I walked the 300 meters from OTC to my office.

I would like to point out that Governor JB Pritzker (D) made my morning commute possible today, by restoring funding to the Ravenswood Metra station construction that took 12 years to complete because of his Republican predecessor's ideological cruelty. I really hope that Bruce Rauner goes to hell, and has to stand on the temporary, unsheltered platform for every minute that every commuter had to over the years we waited for the project to resume.

Now we're just waiting for the new Alstom train sets to arrive (probably 3 years from now) and for the electrification of the remaining diesel-powered Metra lines (probably 40 years from now). Apparently, though, adding a third track to the UP-N mainline between Rogers Park and Clybourn might happen before 2035. We'll see.

I may have my next Japanese itinerary, courtesy of Not Just Bikes:

Imagine an overnight train from New York to Miami that takes 12 hours. China just opened a $165 train that does about the same thing:

From Hong Kong to Beijing, the overnight trip takes 12 hours 30 minutes, and it covers roughly the same distance as a flight from New York to Miami or Los Angeles to Dallas. It complements the 8 hour 15 minute day train that has run for years.

The overnight trip to Shanghai takes 11 hours. The corresponding day train takes just 7 hours 47 minutes.

We can have similar rail lines and options, if we choose to. The Federal Railroad Administration has in fact published plans that call for HSR service between cities of similar (or longer) distances. For example, the Midwest Regional Rail Plan calls for high-speed trains between St. Paul and Nashville, while the Southeast Regional Rail Plan calls for high-speed trains between Nashville and Orlando.

Together, the plans would create a single HSR line of about 1,500 miles. So, a family in St. Paul could board a sleeper train in the evening and be at Orlando’s Disney World by mid-morning the next day—rested and ready to go, instead of stressed out from driving and poorer from a hotel stay.

I will grant two things that make this a difficult problem for the US: the fifth amendment and our psychotic relationship with cars. The first requires that the government provides just compensation for any property it takes, and buying the land to create a grade-separated high-speed rail line would not be cheap. China just kicks people off their land.

The second is that we've spent a century subsidizing cars and building our physical environment around cars, which prevents even reasonable people from understanding the basic economics behind highways. (Or, if you're the Chicago Tribune editorial board, the basic understanding of how traffic works.)

Still, it frustrates me to no end that we're not even discussing it.

In the early autumn I'm going to get on a train in London, change in Paris, and get off the train in Marseille, which will take about 7 hours, depending on how tight I want to make the connection between Gare du Nord and Gare de Lyon. I'll get to St Pancras about half an hour before the train, very likely from a hotel a few blocks away, and when I get off the train in Marseille, I'll have another walk of a block or two to that hotel. Contrast with my flight home from Marseille, which, including half an hour by transit to the Provence airport, customs, emigration in France and immigration into the UK, will take about the same length of time. And then I'll be at Heathrow, an hour from central London.

I once made it from central Richmond, Va., to a friend's apartment in Murray Hill, Manhattan, in just over 5 hours, door to door. So I know the US has the ability to build real high-speed trains. But will I ever see one in my lifetime?

Dignitaries and Metra executives celebrated the opening of the Peterson-Ridge station on the UP-North line this past Sunday:

Hopefully West Ridge, Edgewater, and Lincoln Square residents remembered that patience is a virtue, as they waited for more than ten years for Metra's new Peterson/Ridge station, 1780 W. Peterson Ave., to serve their communities. The commuter railroad, elected officials, and neighbors rejoiced over the completion of the Union Pacific North line stop, which opened on May 20, with an official ribbon-cutting ceremony this morning.

The $27.8 million project included a pair of new six-car platforms; heated concrete stairs and wheelchair ramps; a warming house; two shelters; an access drive; and lots of car and bicycle parking. It was bankrolled with $15 million from the state's Rebuild Illinois capital program, with the remainder of the cash coming from the Federal Transit Administration.

The new station was discussed for over a decade, and took more than two-and-a-half years to construct. That was about a year longer than planned, and the project cost roughly $5 million more than expected, according to a Tribune report last month by Sarah Freishtat.

"I'm glad it's finally done!" local alder Andre Vasquez (40th) told Streetsblog this morning. "This was like, I wouldn't say a CTA-level delay, but it's completed, so that's awesome... We kind of showed up on the last leg of it. [Ald. Vasquez took office last year.] During the [Governor Bruce] Rauner era there were funding challenges."

Just 3 km south, the Ravenswood station—my damn station—took more than 12 years to rebuild because of "Rauner era funding challenges." When it finally opened almost a year ago, did we get a fancy ribbon-cutting? No. Did politicians show up and give speeches? Nope. Did anyone even mention it before, one day, they cordoned off the 10-year-old "temporary" platform? Guess again.

Ravenswood, by the way, was the busiest station on the UP-N and the 3rd-busiest overall just before the pandemic. Ridge-Peterson never existed before, though trains used to stop at the Rosehill Cemetery gate two blocks south and at Granville, a block north, until 1958. (A 1955 schedule I saw showed a 40-minute travel time between Ravenswood and the Loop. It's now 16-18 minutes.)

Urbanist channel Not Just Bikes gushes at the integration and efficiency of the world's busiest train station, Tokyo's Shinjuku:

I passed through it every day during my visit to Tokyo in 2011, and yes, it is a marvel.

I started my day with overlapping meetings, a visit from the housekeeping service, more meetings, a visit from an electrician, and just now discovered that a "new" bug report actually relates a bug we introduced on June 20th last year, but only now got reported. Oh, also: it's 25°C and sunny.

At least it's Friday.

And I guess I can read some of these tomorrow morning:

• Tara Palmeri examines the Beltway reactions to the convicted-felon XPOTUS's 34-count felony conviction. (But Josh Marshall says of this post: "Her dispatch on Trump’s conviction is just drenched in the contempt in which she holds all Democrats.")
• Metra had a public meeting to discuss their Systemwide Network Plan, which outlines a shift from a commuter model to a regional transportation model.
• Related to that, a group of Chicago alders want the state to change direction on the planned Lake Shore Drive redesign to focus on buses rather than cars.
• Japan will soon introduce new Yen notes that may break millions of vending machines across the country.
• SOM's lead architect explains the O'Hare Terminal 2 redesign.
• Michelle Singletary answers your questions about whether tipping has gone too far.

Finally, the Chicago White Sox set a new team record yesterday: 14 losses in a row. They play the Red Sox tonight at home; can they make it 15 straight losses?

The last three days—i.e., the first three days of Summer—have shown us most of the weather we can expect this season. It rained most of Saturday, yesterday we had cool, sunny, and eminently walkable weather, and today it's hot and sticky with thunderstorms on the way. At least Cassie and I got to spend most of yesterday outside.

In other news:

• David French argues that Justice Sonia Sotomayor's (I) recent opinion defending the National Rifle Association "reinforced the constitutional wall of protection against vengeful government leaders, including Trump."
• A former US State Dept official warns that the Democratic National Convention in Chicago this August is "read meat to Russian intelligence services."
• Traffic engineer Wes Marshall has released a new book blaming his industry for the carnage on American roads.
• Monochrome Brewing opened in Pilsen this weekend in the former Lo Rez Brewing space on Carpenter St.

Finally, a really fun video from Berlin setting an old German tongue-twister to a beat has garnered more TikTok views than Beyoncé. Apparently Germans, especially those named Barbara, really love their rhubarb pies.

Just doing a quick review of the Brews & Choos-eligible establishments within 2 km of the Milwaukee Amtrak station this morning, I discovered that seven breweries and a distillery have opened since the project started. Accounting for the demise of Milwaukee Ale House, that brings the total to 11 breweries and 2 distilleries. I'll have to make two trips. Now all I have to do is find a weekend...or two...or three...

Now that Cassie's poop no longer has Giardia cysts in it, she went back to day camp today, so that I could go to my downtown office for the first time in nearly two weeks. To celebrate, it looks like I'll get to walk home from her day care in a thunderstorm.

Before that happens, though:

• Russian journalist Mikhail Zygar warns that our 2024 election looks eerily like the 1996 Russian election that eventually led to Vladimir Putin becoming dictator.
• New Republic's Thom Hartman lays out how the "mud-sill theory" of a permanent economic underclass explains so much of the right wing's horrible policy agenda.
• The Beeb examines why so many popular tourist destinations seem not to want tourists anymore.
• A homeowner on the 400 block of Sheridan Road in Winnetka, Ill., the 9th wealthiest suburb in the US, shot at three men trying to steal his Ferrari this morning. (No people or cars were hurt.)
• Skidmore, Owings & Merrill released renderings of the planned O'Hare Airport satellite terminal that could open as early as 2027.
• Unions have banded together with people who live near railroads to restrict the operation of remote-controlled trains after multiple deaths.

Finally, the MLB's least-popular umpire, Ángel Hernández, has announced his retirement, to much rejoicing. The Post has a retrospective on his worst calls over the years.

Welcome to stop #104 on the Brews and Choos project.

Brewery: Demo Brewing, 1763 W. Berteau Ave., Chicago
Train line: Union Pacific North, Ravenswood. (Also CTA Brown Line, Irving Park)
Time from Chicago: 16 minutes (zone 2)
Distance from station: 1.1 km (400 m from CTA)

The newest brewery on Malt Row opened March 29th just 2 km from Inner Drive Technology World Headquarters and less than 500 meters from the CTA. I had a lot going on in April so I didn't get to check it out until last weekend. Cassie came with and met a couple of friends while my friends and I tried some of their beers.

For a variety of reasons, including Cassie wanting to meet every other dog in the place and the humans wanting to, you know, talk to each other, I didn't take detailed tasting notes. I had a pint of the Brunch Goblin Brut IPA (7%, 32 IBU), which I found refreshing and light, despite its strength. Given its proximity to my house, and its open-door policy to dogs, Cassie and I will return probably over Memorial Day weekend when I'll try a few other beers.

It won't replace Spiteful as my third place, but Cassie and I will put it in rotation along the south end of Malt Row with Dovetail and Begyle.

Beer garden? No
Dogs OK? Yes
Televisions? No
Serves food? No, BYOF
Would hang out with a book? Yes
Would hang out with friends? Yes
Would go back? Yes