Forest Park is a station on the

Chicago Transit Authority The Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) is the operator of mass transit in Chicago, Illinois, United States, and some of its surrounding suburbs, including the trains of the Chicago 'L' and CTA bus service. In , the system had a ridership of , o ...

's 'L' system, located in the village of

Forest Park, Illinois Forest Park (formerly Harlem) is a village in Cook County, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, United States. The population was 14,339 at the 2020 census. The Forest Park terminal on the CTA Blue Line is the line's western terminus, located on the ...

and serving the Blue Line. Before the Congress Line was built, it served as terminal for the Garfield Line. It is the western terminus of the Forest Park branch. The station was known as Des Plaines until 1994. It is also referred to as the Forest Park Transit Center by

Pace Pace or paces may refer to: Business *Pace (transit), a bus operator in the suburbs of Chicago, US * Pace Airlines, an American charter airline *Pace Foods, a maker of a popular brand of salsa sold in North America, owned by Campbell Soup Compan ...

because it is a major terminal for Pace buses. The station contains a 1051-space

Park and Ride A park and ride, also known as incentive parking or a commuter lot, is a parking lot with public transport connections that allows commuting, commuters and other people heading to city centres to leave their vehicles and transfer to a bus, Rail t ...

lot which uses the "Pay and Display" system, in which fees are paid at the lot entrance. It is located south of the

Baltimore and Ohio Chicago Terminal Railroad The Baltimore and Ohio Chicago Terminal Railroad is a terminal railroad in the Chicago area, formerly giving various other companies access to (Chicago's) Grand Central Station. It also served to connect those railroads for freight transfers, and ...

tracks which curve to the north of the station towards Madison Street where the line rechristens itself to the

Canadian National Railway The Canadian National Railway Company (french: Compagnie des chemins de fer nationaux du Canada) is a Canadian Class I freight railway headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, which serves Canada and the Midwestern and Southern United States. CN i ...

's Waukesha Subdivision.

History

Forest Park opened in 1902, as a local

interurban The Interurban (or radial railway in Europe and Canada) is a type of electric railway, with streetcar-like electric self-propelled rail cars which run within and between cities or towns. They were very prevalent in North America between 1900 a ...

station on the Aurora Elgin and Chicago Railway. On March 11, 1905, the

Metropolitan West Side Elevated Railroad The Metropolitan West Side Elevated Railroad (known as the ''Met'' or ''Polly "L"'') was the third elevated rapid transit line to be built in Chicago, Illinois and was the first of Chicago’s elevated lines to be electrically powered. The lin ...

extended its Garfield Park rapid transit service west over the tracks of the Aurora Elgin and Chicago. An amusement park was located in this lot for 14 years (1908-1922) when an enormous fire incinerated parts of it, causing it to be shut down permanently. At this time Forest Park became the western terminal for the 'L' while continuing to serve as an interurban station. In 1958, the Congress Branch opened in the median of the

Eisenhower Expressway Interstate 290 (I-290) is an auxiliary Interstate Highway that runs westward from the Chicago Loop. The portion of I-290 from I-294 to its east end is officially called the Dwight D. Eisenhower Expressway. In short form, it is known as "the ...

, the Blue Line was rerouted and connected to the Milwaukee-Dearborn Subway Station LaSalle making Forest Park, the southern terminus of the Blue Line. Forest Park, however, is one of the few stations in the Congress Branch line that is not in the median of the Eisenhower Expressway, and is north of it. In 1966, the park-and-ride schedule of 1051 seats was opened and a new station was built and completed in December 1982 along with the Transit Center that provides connection to many bus lines. On December 16, 2012, the CTA discontinued the 17 Westchester route, leaving only Pace buses to serve Forest Park. The station is open 24 hours a day/7 days a week and 1,175,588 passengers used the station in 2011.

Bus connections

* 301 Roosevelt Road * 303 Forest Park-Rosemont * 305 East Roosevelt Road * 308 Medical Center * 310 Madison Street-Hillside * 317 Westchester * 318 West North Avenue

References

External links

Forest Park Station Page
{{CA&E, Main=y Forest Park, Illinois CTA Blue Line stations Chicago "L" terminal stations Railway stations in the United States opened in 1905 Former Chicago, Aurora, and Elgin stations 1905 establishments in Illinois Former Chicago Great Western Railway stations