{"id":488327,"date":"2026-01-03T01:16:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T01:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/488327\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T01:16:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T01:16:10","slug":"cta-state-and-lake-station-closing-for-3-years-starting-monday-commuters-brace-for-downtown-chicago-traffic-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/488327\/","title":{"rendered":"CTA State and Lake station closing for 3 years starting Monday; commuters brace for downtown Chicago traffic issues"},"content":{"rendered":"

CHICAGO (WLS) — Starting Monday, the CTA’s historic State and Lake platform shut down for three years.<\/p>\n

It is a massive undertaking of a project that officials say is long overdue. Commuters are surprised by how long the construction will take, but the Chicago Department of Transportation says it will be worth the wait.<\/p>\n

ABC7 Chicago is now streaming 24\/7. Click here to watch<\/a><\/p>\n

One of the busiest CTA stations in Chicago is now set to shut down until 2029 as the 130-year-old platform in the Loop gets a massive makeover<\/a>.<\/p>\n

CTA riders are already frustrated with how long the construction is planned for.<\/p>\n

“It’s a little too long, but hopefully it’s nice,” said CTA rider Luke Goebel.<\/p>\n

CTA riders coming through the Loop will now need to get off the train at Washington and Wabash or Clark and Lake.<\/p>\n

“I’m glad,” said CTA rider April Siruno. “It’ll be worth the wait when everything is interconnected, that makes more sense.”<\/p>\n

One of the main improvements that comes with this project is making it more accessible, especially for those with wheelchairs.<\/p>\n

SEE ALSO |<\/strong> FTA calls for more aggressive CTA safety plan as Chicago police begin added patrols<\/a><\/p>\n

“The station isn’t accessible to folks in wheelchairs, and we’re trying to make it accessible for all of our transit riders,” said CDOT Deputy Commissioner Anne Zhang.<\/p>\n

Renderings of the project show the new modernized upgrades as the designers of the project say this will improve the platform from top to bottom.<\/p>\n

“It is not an aesthetic upgrade. It’s not a superficial upgrade. It’s kind of open-heart surgery on a station. We’re going to be replacing almost the entire station,” said Skidmore, Owings & Merrill Partner Scott Duncan.<\/p>\n

Some commuters say it will be nice to have a new platform while others say they would rather see the money for this project go to public safety across the CTA instead.<\/p>\n

“They should have more security. If they got the money to upgrade this, why don’t they have the money for security? I heard they’re putting more security, but I haven’t seen it,” said CTA rider Chris Gonzalez.<\/p>\n

Those concerns come as the CTA just launched its new security surge plan<\/a> last month, putting more officers and K-9s on platforms across the city.<\/p>\n

There will also certainly be some frustration for drivers coming through the area.<\/p>\n

Starting Monday, Lake Street will only be open to local traffic between Dearborn and Wabash.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 WLS-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHICAGO (WLS) — Starting Monday, the CTA’s historic State and Lake platform shut down for three years. It…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":488328,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5124],"tags":[220368,960,211854,91739,5462,8755,143497,5386,1818,220367,220366],"class_list":{"0":"post-488327","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago","8":"tag-220368","9":"tag-chicago","10":"tag-chicago-construction","11":"tag-chicago-cta","12":"tag-chicago-news","13":"tag-chicago-traffic","14":"tag-cta-train","15":"tag-il","16":"tag-illinois","17":"tag-state-and-lake-cta","18":"tag-state-and-lake-station"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115828528691440279","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=488327"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488327\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/488328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=488327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=488327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=488327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}