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Photo courtesy Chicago Transit Authority
CTA’s Red and Purple Modernization project has already netted improvements for transit riders, but the project, along with CTA’s Red Line Extension, now face a federal funding freeze.
The U.S. Dept. of Transportation is freezing $2.1 billion for the Chicago Transit Authority’s Red Line Extension and Red and Purple Modernization while it conducts a review of the hiring practices used on the projects in relation to an interim final rule on disadvantaged business enterprises that it published in the Federal Register Oct. 3.
The rule bars requirements around race and sex in federal transportation grants, and directs DBE programs to re-review all firms they’ve certified under those new standards. In its statement, DOT called existing DBE practices “unconstitutional.”
DOT is also reviewing the New York MTA’s Second Avenue Subway Phase 2 and the Gateway Development Commission’s Hudson Tunnel Project between New York and New Jersey, and freezing $18 billion for those projects in the meantime, it announced on Oct. 1.
“Together, these critical reviews are intended to ensure no additional federal dollars go towards discriminatory, illegal, and wasteful contracting practices,” DOT said in its statement.
The $2.9-billion Red Line Extension project is adding 5.5 miles and four stations at 103rd Street, 111th Street, Michigan Avenue and 130th Street. CTA picked design-build contractors Walsh-VINCI Transit Community Partners to lead the project, and early work is underway with site preparations, building demolitions and utility relocations.
CTA’s $2.1-billion Red and Purple Modernization is updating the single set of tracks that the two lines run on with new signals, a bypass structure north of Belmont station, track structure replacement and reconstruction of stations. The project has already reduced travel times for riders in addition to creating accessible stations, four of which opened this summer, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said in a statement.
The transit authority did not immediately say whether the project schedules would be impacted.
Johnson called the move a “politically motivated decision by the White House Office of Management and Budget.” OMB Director Russel Vought tweeted about both the New York and Chicago funding freezes ahead of DOT’s announcements, as well as $7.5 billion in canceled Dept. of Energy grants ahead of DOE’s announcement.
“We are calling for these cuts to be immediately reversed, and we will use every tool at our disposal to restore this funding,” Johnson said.
While the U.S. DOT withholds federal funding for the projects pending its review, it also indicated the review would be delayed by the current government shutdown. In its statement, it blamed Democrats for the shutdown, though the Senate once again on Oct. 3 rejected stopgap spending bills sponsored by both Republicans and Democrats.
The funding freeze also comes as the Trump administration and state officials have been in disagreement over increased immigration enforcement and a plan Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) said the administration has to deploy National Guard troops in the city.
“At a time when federal agents are sowing chaos in Chicago, the Trump administration is holding bipartisan funding hostage,” Pritzker tweeted Oct. 3. “It’s attempting to score political points but is instead hurting our economy and the hardworking people who rely on public transit to get to work or school.”
James Leggate is an online news editor at ENR. He has reported on a variety of issues for more than 10 years and his work has contributed to several regional Associated Press Media Editors and Murrow award wins.
