The president of Amtrak expressed “significant concerns” to Mayor Brandon Johnson about the potential use of Chicago Union Station for Greyhound buses, roughly a month before the intercity bus company could be booted from its West Loop terminal.
In a letter Tuesday to Johnson and Transportation Commissioner Tom Carney, Amtrak President Roger Harris encouraged the city to consider a different location.
Harris said Union Station, which Amtrak owns, does not have the capacity to handle the expected 50 additional buses per day.
Amtrak should also be compensated for any additional costs associated with hosting bus riders, who would use the station’s Great Hall, Harris wrote.
We “believe the challenges of this location raise significant safety, operational and financial concerns for the users of Chicago Union Station, tenants and the surrounding neighborhood,” Harris wrote.
“We have significant concerns with this potential location.”
Instead, Harris encouraged the city to consider a different location for an intercity bus stop, suggesting either the Ogilvie or La Salle Street Metra stations, which are both commuter rail stations with restrooms, waiting rooms and unused ticketing windows.
The Ogilvie Transportation Center, 500 W. Madison St., has two CTA bus lanes on Washington Boulevard that are protected by tracks overhead, Harris wrote. La Salle Street Station, 414 S. La Salle St., has one CTA bus lane with a partial canopy on Financial Place.
“These locations — and others — would certainly provide a safer experience and improved accommodations for intercity bus riders than that block on Jackson Boulevard,” Harris wrote.
Metra declined to comment.
Amtrak’s letter comes nearly a week after the city’s chief operating officer, John Roberson, told the Sun-Times the city was zeroing in on Union Station as a temporary stop for Greyhound and other intercity bus travelers.
“Based on what we’ve seen, we think that is the best option right now from the city’s standpoint,” Roberson told the Sun-Times.
A week earlier, Greyhound’s chief executive told the Sun-Times the city was not taking the process seriously.
Amtrak, caught in the middle, says it has been left out of negotiations.
Mayoral ally Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa (35th) said he has arranged a meeting between city and Amtrak officials to take place after the Democratic National Convention.
Ramirez-Rosa said he met with city officials, including Roberson, on Monday and asked that they not sign off on any permit to change the bus stop until after the meeting.
Ramirez-Rosa wants the city to pick a location other than Union Station. He said Greyhound should shoulder some of the costs of a station, and suggested bus companies use several of the available bus stops throughout downtown.
“Really, it should not fall to an under-resourced federal agency to cover the facilities of a for-profit corporation,” Ramirez-Rosa said in an interview.
“The City is continuing to evaluate alternative options to ensure bus services continue without interruption to maintain our responsibility to our residents to provide accessible and affordable transportation options,” CDOT said in a statement. “We will continue to engage with Amtrak, Greyhound, and other private and public stakeholders to determine a staging location for intercity buses.”
Greyhound owner FlixBus declined to comment.
The Greyhound station issue began three years ago when the bus operation was sold to the German firm FlixBus, and the terminals were sold to another buyer. Greyhound has been losing its stations one by one, catching some cities off-guard.
DePaul University professor Joseph Schwieterman first publicized last year that Greyhound was set to lose its station at 630 W. Harrison St.
He has recommended that the city purchase its own intercity bus terminal and rent it to bus companies, similar to the way the airports work with airlines.
If Greyhound loses its station in September, Chicago will be the largest city in the nation not to have its own municipally-owned bus terminal.