1908+1994 CTA Howard Yard and Shop

(Satellite)

Kevin Heinlein posted
Scott Greig: Howard Street terminal, looking north from the east platform.
Mark Leiber: The train on the left was at the beginning of the Skokie Valley route for the North Shore I believe. Straight ahead went to Evanston (CTA) and shoreline route for the North Shore.

 

Kevin Heinlein posted
Scott Greig: Howard yard, mid-1960s.

Marty Bernard posted
CTA 6000s Looping at Howard
Chicago Transit Authority 6000 series cars head around the terminal loop at Howard Yard, Chicago, in Feb. 1975. The yard is fairly full. Must have been midday.
Marty Bernard shared
Paul Musselman: At Howard, I hid behind a seat and got to ride around that loop.......
Alan Follett: Also, Skokie Swift articulated sets on the fifth storage track from the left.

Trainbook posted
“Chicago Transit Authority - Howard Yard - Evanston, Illinois, USA (February, 2014)” by Frank Rizzo.
Discover Frank Rizzo’s photos here: https://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=471508&nseq=32
Marty Bernard: The depot and the yard are in Chicago, not Evanston.
Mike Repka: Sure can turn those subway cars on tight curves!

Chicago-L-howard
A Skokie Swift 3200-series train sets off for Dempster Street through Howard Yard, looking north on April 10, 1998. The ascending tracks in the center and on the left in the background lead to the Purple (Evanston) Line, while the descending tracks on the left (going under the Evanston tracks) are the Yellow Line (Skokie Swift). (Photo by Sean Gash)
[There are several more photos of the yard available on this web site.]

In 1908, the Northwestern "L" extended its service north of Wilson to Central Avenue in Evanston by joining the Chicago & Evanston branch of the Milwaukee Road. [DennisDeBruler-wilson] A small Howard Yard was built for this Evanston Division. Several additional expansions were done to the yard over the decades. The last expansion was a decade long expansion that was done in the late 1980s and early 90s to handle more trains on a new north-south route. The original north-south route connected the Howard Line with the Englewood+Jackson Park Line using the State Street Subway. And the original west-south route connected the Lake Line with the Dan Ryan Line using the Loop. But the ridership was high on the Howard and Dan Ryan lines and significantly lower on the other two. So the decision was made in the 1980s to build another subway tunnel to connect the Howard and Dan Ryan Lines. [DennisDeBruler-history] And the Lake and Englewood+Jackson Park Lines were connected with the Loop. Furthermore, the major repair shops for the Howard Line were still at the 1900s terminus at Wilson. So a major expansion was done of the Howard Yard between the mid-1980s and 1994 to increase the storage capacity, build a new repair shop and untangle the connections between the Yellow (Skokie), Purple (Evanston) and Red (Howard-Dan Ryan) Lines. Storage was increased from 84 to 310 cars. After the new Howard Yard opened, the Wilson Yard closed.  [Chicago-L-howard]