Do you think the CTA/METRA will come back after Covid or will it become obsolete? (Chicago: crime, attorney)

[dtcbnd03]

Originally Posted by BRU67

Yes they will.

No they won't. The NY MTA was facing a large deficit even before covid. After covid and fewer riders with remote work there's no way. I bet you can find similar figures for Chicago. Only govt would think to expand as ridership declines...makes no sense.

"N.Y. Subway, Facing a $16 Billion Deficit, Plans for Deep Cuts"

"After the great recession in 2008, the M.T.A. eliminated two subway lines and dozens of bus routes to close a major budget gap. And with the city on the brink of bankruptcy in the 1970s, the subway became a global symbol of urban decay with rampant crime, graffiti-covered trains and constant mechanical breakdowns."

"Even as New York has started to slowly reopen, daily subway ridership has plateaued at around 20 percent of its usual 5.5 million passengers in recent weeks."

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/21/n...cial-cuts.html

[BRU67]

Originally Posted by dtcbnd03

No they won't. The NY MTA was facing a large deficit even before covid. After covid and fewer riders with remote work there's no way. I bet you can find similar figures for Chicago. Only govt would think to expand as ridership declines...makes no sense.

"N.Y. Subway, Facing a $16 Billion Deficit, Plans for Deep Cuts"

"After the great recession in 2008, the M.T.A. eliminated two subway lines and dozens of bus routes to close a major budget gap. And with the city on the brink of bankruptcy in the 1970s, the subway became a global symbol of urban decay with rampant crime, graffiti-covered trains and constant mechanical breakdowns."

"Even as New York has started to slowly reopen, daily subway ridership has plateaued at around 20 percent of its usual 5.5 million passengers in recent weeks."

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/21/n...cial-cuts.html

Well, keep dreaming. It'll surely come true if you post about it enough. Young employees do not want to work in isolation. You spend 8-10 hours per day at work and for many, work is a social opportunity. Employers are also probably sick of the lack of collaboration one poster spoke about and, if all the stupid videos I see on Tic Toc are any indication, reduced productivity. My employer refused to let us work from home for this reason. And I'm not the only one. And as we've been saying, there are a lot of people who do not have cushy office jobs they can do from their bedroom.

As soon as the vaccines have been widely implemented, employers are going to want people to come back to actual work. There might be a few exceptions but, on the whole, that's going to be the case. And I doubt there's going to be much of an uproar against it. You can only spend so much time in your apartment or in suburban utopia. And with that, will come the increased demand for public transit we are speaking of. So we may as well get out in front of it now when we have a big influx of cash and an administration friendly to large cities.

[dtcbnd03]

We shop online instead of in stores (retail is dying).
We date online instead of in person (Match and Bumble stock soaring).
We live on "social" media instead of actually meeting in person.
I can plan in person social events like lunch with coworkers while working from home the other 90% of time.
I'm currently working from the beach instead of in a Chicago office cubicle.
I never plan to go into an office ever again or ride the el except for occasional sporting events or concert.
Everyone is picking up and moving to the cities they prefer to live rather than where their office job is located.
All the data points to less CTA volume and contraction in Chicago.

"Employers expect nearly 2 in 5 employees will still be working remotely at the end of 2021, compared with 57% who work remotely now, although that varies by industry, according to a recent report by Willis Towers Watson, a benefits consulting firm."

"For the most part, workers applaud this new approach. Vaccinated or not, more than half of employees said that, given the option, they would want to keep working from home even after the coronavirus crisis subsides, according to a survey by the Pew Research Center."

"Despite virtual happy hours and game nights with his new co-workers, trying to socialize with people he has never met in person is “really awkward,” he said. Yet Morales-Valiente said he prefers working remotely.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/11/one-...e-to-stay.html

[BRU67]

If I told my employer I was working from the beach, I don't think I'd ever go into the office again either, though for different reasons, LOL! Glad you have a job where you can do that though. You're not in the majority. I'd point out that a 27 percentage point drop in work-from-home by end of 2021 is pretty significant, 2022's drop will also be significant is my guess.

Online dating has been with us for decades, and it didn't slow the growth of Chicago pre-pandemic. For online dating to work, you have to be in an area with a lot of people. Young workers are always going to select vibrant cities, and that was happening in Chicago pre-pandemic. You cannot alter this trend. Certainly a one-year virus isn't going to do it.

[BRU67]

Originally Posted by dtcbnd03

We
"For the most part, workers applaud this new approach. Vaccinated or not, more than half of employees said that, given the option, they would want to keep working from home even after the coronavirus crisis subsides, according to a survey by the Pew Research Center."

"Despite virtual happy hours and game nights with his new co-workers, trying to socialize with people he has never met in person is “really awkward,” he said. Yet Morales-Valiente said he prefers working remotely.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/11/one-...e-to-stay.html

And okay. So about 50% want to go back to work and the other 50%'s employers are going to tell them to come back or they're going to be fired. I don't think that article supports any argument of CTA contraction.

[dtcbnd03]

So now you've shifted your argument from employees will be begging to return to the office (which they will not) to employers will demand 100% employees return to office (which they will not). Every data point is showing numerous companies either switching to 100% remote work or a hybrid model for any job that can be done on a computer. That results in loss of rush hour traffic. It will take Chicago decades for the CTA to backfill that loss in ridership with population growth. This debate reminds me of the scene from the Office where Dwight tries to beat the online paper companies:

[BRU67]

Originally Posted by dtcbnd03

So now you've shifted your argument from employees will be begging to return to the office (which they will not) to employers will demand 100% employees return to office (which they will not). Every data point is showing numerous companies either switching to 100% remote work or a hybrid model for any job that can be done on a computer. That results in loss of rush hour traffic. It will take Chicago decades for the CTA to backfill that loss in ridership with population growth. This debate reminds me of the scene from the Office where Dwight tries to beat the online paper companies:

That's not what I did. I cited to your own source, which states those facts and thus defeats your own premise.

But anyway, keep dreaming. I think a better meme for those buying in the suburbs and banking on a permanent shift is this one....



So to shift back to topic, I'm still not seeing a reason not to go all-in on public transit expansion while the iron is hot and there is money available.

[nap1313]

I was just thinking about the CTA this morning. I haven't stepped on public transit in a year because I've been working remotely. It turns out that I will have to start going back into work at least some days out of the week in April. We only have one car, and my spouse is still going to be working from home, so he will drop our child off at school and I'm relegated to the train. I guess I'm a little nervous and it will feel weird, but by then I should be fully vaccinated. I'm sure there are a lot of people in my position that will slowly start making their way back to the CTA this spring, summer, and fall.

[Marv95]

Originally Posted by dtcbnd03

There is no way any big city should consider public transportation expansion with remote work. The numbers will not support it.

The majority of the working public do not work remote.

[BRU67]

Originally Posted by Marv95

The majority of the working public do not work remote.

It long been the dream of conservatives to see cities decline. They think the remote work thing has finally turned that dream into blissful reality. A reality where all of the good law abiding highly paid people will move to their virtually tax-free red state, while all the nasty liberals and poor suffer in "Escape from New York" style misery, while paying big taxes to support the lazy. Then they can tell all of us that they told us so. Well, they do that already, but it'll be even more so!

While I give dctnb03 a hard time, I do understand it's natural to want to think everyone is like you. But the back to the city movement has been going on since at least the mid-1980s. And as you point out, most of us cannot work remotely, or our employers do not prefer that and will not allow it once restrictions are lifted. I think there will be a recovery period but I do not foresee a significant decrease in CTA ridership long term.