Metra Southwest Service Expansion

CTE prepared final design documents for the expansion of Metra's Southwest Service. Metra's Southwest Service serves residents in southern Cook and Will Counties. Metra commuter rail service via the Southwest Service operates over 28 miles of track and serves ten stations (an eleventh station is in development) between the Village of Orland Park and Union Station in the Chicago Business District. Train operations on the Southwest Service were limited to commuter rush hour service, with one round trip midday train.

Metra planned to extend service 12 miles from 179th street in Orland Park south to Manhattan, Illinois. The project involved CTE's in-house civil, environmental, architectural, structural, mechanical and electrical disciplines. The project added or upgraded seven stations, plus parking lots, access roads, platforms, and depots. It included 17 culverts, 12 new or rehabilitated bridges, one expanded rail yard and one new rail yard, five maintenance of way sidings, approximately four miles of new double track, 40 miles of rehabilitated track, and a new signal system. Improvements allow Metra to expand service from sixteen trains to as many as thirty trains a day. Congestion will be reduced, commuter service from the southwest suburbs to downtown Chicago will be greatly expanded, reliability of service will be improved; air quality will also be improved.