Sat Oct 10 · every city
Report card
These are the conditions behind each grade with every city side by side. It explains. It is not a grade. The first rows come from our own data for this week. Background and funding come from the sources linked in each cell. “Not published” means we found no public figure, not that the answer is zero.
Swipe the card sideways to compare cities →
| New York | Chicago | |
|---|---|---|
| From our data this week | ||
| Weakest time of day | Late night90.3% of trains ran | Evening83.9% of trains ran |
| Worst station | 168 St-Washington Hts1 train, 92.2% ran | RacineBlue Line, 78.0% ran |
| What the agency blamed | No cause given55 of 64 alerts · Train or track equipment 4 · Signals 3 | No cause given2 of 2 alerts |
| Unexplained misses | 31%of 2,395 missing station stops had no alert posted | 89%of 2,074 missing station stops had no alert posted |
| Hours | 24 hours on 20 of 21 linesThe rest don't run all night; the longest daily break is about 5 hours. From the timetable. | 24 hours on 2 of 8 linesThe rest don't run all night; the longest daily break is about 6 hours. From the timetable. |
| Background | ||
| First line opened | 1904Modern CBTC signals on the L (2009), 7 (2018) and Queens Boulevard lines (2022); Second Avenue Subway opened 2017.source 1 source 2 | 1892Major rebuilds: the Red Line's Dan Ryan branch (2013) and Red and Purple Modernization Phase One, Lawrence to Bryn Mawr, substantially complete in 2026.source 1 source 2 source 3 |
| Shares track with other railways | NoOnly subway trains run on subway track.source | NoOnly CTA trains run on CTA track.source |
| Signals | Mostly fixed-block signalsCBTC on the 7, L and Queens Boulevard (E, F, M, R). The 2025-29 capital plan funds CBTC on eight more lines.source 1 source 2 | Track-circuit signalsNo CBTC. RPM Phase One added about 11 miles of new digital track-circuit signaling.source |
| Slow zones | Not publishedWe found no regular public report of how much track is under speed restrictions. | 17.1% of trackApril 2026. CTA publishes a slow zone map every month. Down from over 30% in February 2025.source 1 source 2 |
| Funding | ||
| Fares cover | 44%of operating costs paid by fares · Subway only, 2024source | 20%of operating costs paid by fares · CTA rail ('L') only, 2024source |
| Cost per ride | $2.95operating cost per ridesource | $6.55operating cost per ridesource |
| Subsidy per ride | $1.64paid by taxes and other sources, on top of the faresource | $5.27paid by taxes and other sources, on top of the faresource |
| Capital spending | $1.87 per ride$4.1 billion a year on track, signals, stations and trainssource | $4.63 per ride$590 million a year on track, signals, stations and trainssource |
How the funding figures compare
- New York: National Transit Database, heavy rail, report year 2024, same rules as Chicago. Capital is the sum of the NTD's rail capital categories.
- Chicago: National Transit Database, heavy rail, report year 2024. Operating costs exclude depreciation, as the NTD reports them. Capital is the sum of the NTD's rail capital categories.