Rehab of CTA Blue Line should include reopening closed stations

Regarding the op-ed “Fix the Ike,” it is essential that the planning mistakes of the 1950s, when cities were destroyed to accommodate cars, not be repeated in the 2020s. There is no need to demolish portions of Oak Park, Forest Park, Maywood and Hillside to “expand” I-290.

However, rebuilding the CTA Blue Line and extending it to at least 1st Avenue, possibly to Mannheim Road, will move people through this corridor — people who will not need to park cars once they reach the Medical District, the Loop or wherever they’re going. A vibrant city needs people, not parking.

In the 1970s, the CTA closed the Blue Line stations at California, Kostner and Central Avenue, and the Keeler and Lavergne Avenue auxiliary entrances. For a half-century, people in cars plodding by on the Eisenhower have seen these ghost stations as evidence of official disinvestment on the West Side.

The Blue Line will not serve the people who live and work on the West Side as best it can if we don’t have access to it. It’s essential that rehabilitation of the Blue Line include reopening of the closed stations and auxiliary entrances.

If these stations and entrances are restored, five neighborhoods on the West Side will have an opportunity for residential and commercial growth that they will not have without these L stops, and which they have not had for a half-century.

Let’s not funnel more cars through the West Side and west suburbs. Let’s rebuild the Forest Park branch of the Blue Line, and reopen these old L stops and entrances to serve the West Side. As long as we’re spending billions, let’s do it right.

James R. Anderson, Near West Side

A way to solve the worker shortage

Can anyone explain to me why so many people are freaked out about immigration when employers are desperate to fill openings in their businesses? Why not move ahead with temporary work visas and then process those people as possible legal status immigrants once they have a good work history? We are shooting ourselves in the foot.

Mary F. Warren, Wheaton

Trump can put a stop to threats

Donald Trump could tell his supporters to put a stop to threatening the FBI and Justice Department and the judge who approved the Mar-a-Lago search warrant if he really wanted to. He had the power to stop the Jan. 6 Capitol riots, but he chose to do nothing.

How many of Trump’s supporters are going to die for his failure to act and tell the Trumpettes to quit it? After all, Trump knew what he did was wrong and in violation of the law — so he can uphold the law or violate the law.

So GOP, quit calling yourself the party of law enforcement and act like it. The spineless representatives, senators and cowards need to obey the law, especially if Trump can’t. Someone with brains in the GOP needs to put Trump in his place and call him out on it. Trump needs to take ownership of this and put a stop to it before more people are killed.

Gerald Bernson, Tinley Park

Correction

A letter to the editor by Daniel Biss that appeared in Sunday’s Sun-Times should have listed Evanston 9th Ward Councilmember Juan Geracaris as co-author.