The few times I rode the red line over the last few years I haven't had any major problems. The…read morepeople do get rowdy & sometimes the station/train is dirty. It's also weird how they at times have a lot of TSA level fake security while a drug dealer is literally cattle calling that he is selling weed 20 feet away from them. Like why not just call the police & have them escorted off the premises? At times I've seen security act just as wild as the passengers. The station itself is nice. It looks like it was recently renovated. It's pretty much a bus depot with buses that go all over the southside coming here. As always KEEP YOUR HEAD ON A SWIVEL & CALL THE POLICE if you need help. There are a ton of shady characters. I've seen people before try to get a CTA employee to help them out with an issue & act surprised when the employee doesn't help them. Just like the "security theatre" that is TSA, CTA isn't law enforcement... they CAN'T enforce laws. They will only assist you by making a report & contacting the actual police.

Not in a very nice neighborhood. Fights happens all the time unexpectedly. Few robberies, phone…read moretheft happens alot, that includes gang shootings. Watch your back too especially getting on the Red Line or waiting for Pace Suburban Bus or CTA buses. This station smells like smoke, cheap beer. Don't risk on taking the elevator unless if you ever smelled a crackhead urine. I only go there if I gotta transfer different buses or going straight to Downtown Chicago on CTA Red Line. Don't trust anyone. Do not take the taxi. I had seen few fights there. I had gotten few starred. I had beggars asking me for money too. Just say no if any people asked you anything.

CTA has an L station on Western Avenue on the South Side, which is one of those along the Orange…read moreLine. It goes between The Loop and Midway. Of course it's not in a terrific location, but it's mostly clean and safe. Lots of busses to get onto from here. There's a large area for shelter while waiting for one. A better than expected location, and it's usually pretty fast coming or going. It serves the Orange Line. The station is located in Gage Park. Even though it has a bad history, it's still an improving area. This is at 49th and Western. Best about this is how fast it is to get through here. This is the one that goes all the way to Midway, the other Chicago airport that gets unappreciated. Getting there is a lot faster. Stops like this are one of the reasons. It has fewer, meaning the trains come a lot more often. This station is pretty clean for as busy as it gets, and it doesn't have a bad smell. Getting to Midway is convenient from here. It's only a few stops away, and if you're getting off here there's lots of busses to take you places. There's usually not a long wait for trains.

I used to go to this station alot a few years ago and I gotta say, this station is very impressing…read more Very clean and Fast arriving trains. And when I mean fast, I mean st all times. I rode the orange line around 10:30-11:00pm and boy did it get around fast.

I've had the opportunity to experience the great service provided by Annie's Angels on several…read moreoccasions; in each instance I've been provided with a professional, personable and effective experience. Annie's Angels has provided great customer service, meeting me in locations that have been near to my coordinates, and even visiting my home after hours to meet the needs of my emergency. I can't say enough about Annie's Angels.

I called late night and she answered. She was Very professional and punctual. I will use her…read moreservices again.

Screw you. Seriously…read more On a night (-30 windchills last night) where the CTA had a chance to be a hero ONCE AGAIN, you blew it. Do you actually look at the schedule, or is it just waste paper for the driver to read when they're bored? I use this route once a week to go to U of C to do my radio show. Public transit to Hyde Park is spotty and unreliable at best, shoddy, shabby and non-existant at worst. Getting there - okay, I ride from Garfield Red line to 57th/University. Easy, and I can also catch the 55 or X55 to get me there. Coming back though, it's a crap shoot as to whether or not there'll actually be a bus waiting for me when I come downstairs to the stop near the Reynolds Club at the appointed time - between 6:55 to 7:05. I'd asked the driver before I left, what time the 7ish bus would be returning to 57th/University. He consulted his schedule, and with a lot of brow furrowing and "uhhhh" and trying to develop an opposed thumb to grasp said schedule, finally determined that it'd be back at 6:55. Bueno. Perfect. Stay warm, my friend, see you then. Sooooo, not wanting to be left freezing (though I was, and seriously felt like Shackelton sans sled dogs) I got to the stop at 6:50. Plenty of time, right? When the bus hadn't shown up by 7:15 I called CTA. Scheduled for 7:20 and 7:35. I was skeptical of this because I know this bus only comes one time an hour. Probably the CTA person on the phone was looking at the wrong schedule, though I enunciated icily (literally) on the phone. Predictably no bus at 7:20 OR 7:35. Another call, and the time was 7:50. By this time, I was practically crazy with the hypothermia, and ran out to the exposed tundra to try for the 55. A U of C student came with me, we'd been chatting about the absent 174 bus. I momentarily pondered asking him if he wanted to make out JUST SO I COULD STAY WARM! PEOPLE! I WAS DESPERATE HERE! I THINK MY DARLING, DELICIOUS BF WOULD EVEN HAVE UNDERSTOOD MY PLIGHT! As I resorted to the sanctuary of home, practically sobbing, and giant glasses of vodka after my ordeal. Anyway. *ahem* At 8:00 the 55 bus showed up, STILL no sign of the 7:50 174 (which would have gotten to 55/University by the time I was waiting there). But anyway, relief, from my guardian angel #55. Seriously, what gives? Do you just freestyle it, and figure the slacker students won't notice? U of C students are not slackers (I am neither a student NOR a slacker). And when the university is on a break - what, do you just not run? Sit on the side of the road and drink? Seriously, people still LIVE in Hyde Park (like Barack Obama, for one!!) that need to get to the campus and nearby. The 174 buses are all shiny and new and pretty clean, but seriously . . . . fix that scheduling glitch, bitches.

I've been riding the Rock Island Metra for more than 20 years, from my first day of junior high to…read moremy job in management now. Over the years, the most noticeable changes for the line have been the loss of the food and beverage cars, the dramatic rise in fares, and the diversification of the train personnel. (In the '90s, it wasn't uncommon for a white trainman to call Black youth "monkeys" to their faces and threaten them with arrest for not showing their student IDs quickly enough.) Besides that, the trains and the experience of riding are largely the same as they were in 1996. Some conductors, trainmen and other employees are consistently friendly and talkative. Others take pleasure in terrorizing the passengers, including long-time riders like myself. Recently, I tried to board a weekend train with a bottle of peach Izze (a nonalcoholic beverage) in my bag. One of the many (African-American!) security men on the platform told me that I wouldn't be allowed to board the train with it, and added that I'd be the next victim of iPhone-worthy police brutality if I attempted to argue that it was acceptable to bring this unopened nonalcoholic beverage on the train, as I had for many years up until that point. I was then forced to catch the Red Line El to 95th Street, then transfer to a CTA bus to get home that night, as I had been trying to board the 8:10 PM Metra and the next Metra wasn't departing until 11:15 PM. I witnessed another trainman physically assault a passenger and then call the police on him for fighting back. (This incident resulted in the train being delayed between 111th and 115th St, and the arrest and incarceration of the passenger who had been assaulted by the trainman.) Another called the police on a young woman, age 20 or so, because he spotted marijuana in her backpack. This resulted in an unnecessarily long train delay while the young woman was being booked and arrested outside of the train. I'm sure she wasn't hurting anybody by having marijuana in her possession, but the trainman was hurting the passengers by making us wait to resume our journey until he finished getting the poor girl a criminal record. Substantial train delays, always with flimsy excuses ("due to boarding of a disabled passenger," which I'm sure must be embarrassing for the disabled passenger if s/he actually exists), are particularly frequent on the weekends. But sometimes, the weekend trains will arrive EARLY, which causes passengers like me to panic as we try to safely get to the one or two doors that are open. On one occasion not too long ago, I waited for an early train to arrive at the station before running around it to safely board. As I arrived at the ONE door that the train personnel had bothered to open for passenger boarding, the conductor waved it closed and took off without me - knowing that I'd likely have to wait two hours for the next Metra or be forced to catch the (unsafe on Chicago's far South Side) CTA bus and El trains. This incident and others like it understandably puts riders under pressure to rush to make the rare early train, or to choose between being stranded on the South Side until the next Metra comes hours later or enduring the anxiety of riding the CTA through neighborhoods noted for high crime rates. It's amazing that Metra can demand such a high level of patience from passengers who routinely pay over $140 per month for tickets, yet the train personnel don't even have the courtesy to wait for us to board the trains properly in inclement weather. Metra should be able to guarantee its monthly passholders respectful treatment by the train personnel. And if it wants to boost ridership, it should be able to guarantee that even for passengers who are riding the Metra for the first and only times in their lives. Most of the adults and children I've known to ride the Metra over the years eventually gave it up in favor of driving. They'd rather pay an arm and a leg to park downtown than risk poor service and abuse by Metra personnel.

The conductors are some miserable , rude people . Part of the training must be " be as rude to…read morepeople as you possibly can , especially people who don't ride the train usually and don't really know how things are done " .

Review for ADA pace service. The buses are like riding in a sardine can. You literally bounce in…read morethe Air when going over a small bump..it's dangerous. Drovers are usually okay. The call center can be rude...often but for $3. 50... What do you expect. It's still a blessing. '***. But it's ridiculous that ADA service doesn't go to many addresses in Naperville and warrenvile. It supposed to cover all dupage county.

Pace bus is the worse think twice before using this as a means of transportation as times are…read moreextremely inaccurate, I'm talking you will be waiting 30 mins longer then the scheduled time via the app... why even have a schedule and not follow it, CTA may get a little rough at times but I would take a CTA bus over a pace bus any day. At least with CTA you'll know that you will get to important places on time...

Took the Orange line into downtown Chicago the other day and it was an interesting experience. The…read moreOrange line is connected to Midway Airport which is convenient. The turnstile takes NFC payments making it a breeze to pay. I did hear on the loudspeaker a staff requesting a passenger to pay and that they were on video?!? The ride into Chicago downtown was surprisingly jerky. Signage at the platform indicating the next train was misleading as it changed at the last minute. Standing for the duration of the ride was challenging due to the jerky braking and the jerky acceleration...maybe it's cultural?

I love a great rail system, and this is a great rail system…read more The station is very clean, the employees present at ticketing are very kind, the directions to obtain tickets were clear and consise. The train that we boarded was very clean, and comfy. I highly recommend this mode of transportation while visiting ChiTown.

This is another one of my favorite Metra stops I can easily drive to . I've been coming to this…read moreMetra stop for years . It's normally pretty clean and if you have anything that needs to be taken care of with safety the conductors take care of it .

My husband and I took the L train during our week long stay in Chicago. Cermak-McCormick Place is…read morean above ground train station run by the CTA. It's on the Green line. We took Cermak-McCormick after visiting the Blues Heaven Foundation a few blocks away. We were headed to Chicago Music Exchange on N Lincoln. Our route was Cermak-McCormick to Clark/Lake, where we transferred to the Brown line for the Paulina train stop. We were at the train station on a hot summer day, but fortunately there was some breeze on the first/street level of the station. There was a few spots to hide from the sun on the platform. The station is clean and is clearly video monitored. Plus, there are some cool cartoon illustrations to checkout on the platform while waiting for your train.

This CTA Station is usually where I go to if I'm heading to or from McCormick Place. It's well…read morecovered to shield you from the elements and it's usually kept clean. They have good signage here, so it's easy even for first-timers to figure out which train to catch. There's also a White Castle right next door if you want to grab a quick bite before catching the next Green line train.