Press Release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Chicago Aldermanic Candidate, Nate Cornell, Calls for New CTA Green Line Station at Western Ave

CHICAGO, IL (SEPTEMBER 15, 2026) - Candidate for 27th Ward Alderman, Nate Cornell is rallying Chicago voters, businesses, and urban planners to ask Mayor Johnson and 27th Ward Alderman Walter Redmond Burnett to build a new CTA Green Line train station at Western Ave. and Lake St.

Today, the lack of this CTA station on Chicago's longest and busiest street - extending 24 miles, with 21,000 daily CTA bus riders and about 30,000 daily vehicles - is a glaring shortfall on the CTA grid.

In 2012, city officials opened the CTA Green Line Morgan St. station in Fulton Market after significant lobbying by the Fulton Market Association, a non-profit agency. Since the station opened, bold economic development has boomed in the Market. Twelve years later, city officials opened the CTA Green Line Damen Ave. station in 2024 for the United Center and Kinzie Corridor areas, again after advocacy from the Fulton Market Association.

“Residents should not have to wait over a decade for a new Green Line station,” said Cornell, candidate for Chicago's 27th Ward. “This new station would boost economic development and financial investment for the Near West Side and Garfield Park neighborhoods, subsequently spurring new businesses, jobs and housing opportunities.”

This station, proposed to be at the corner of Lake St. and Western Ave., would improve the quality of life for thousands of residents in the Near West Side and Garfield Park neighborhoods, for citywide CTA riders, and for regional RTA riders by providing affordable, fast transit to jobs, groceries, schools, housing, and services.

A new Western Ave. station is estimated at $80 million, based on the 2024 CTA Green Line Damen Ave. station cost. The Western and Lake intersection is inside the city's Kinzie Corridor tax increment finance district (TIF), which has collected over $400 million in local property taxes and rents since 1998.

Besides city TIF funds, Governor Pritzker and state lawmakers should contribute public funds for this new station from their infrastructure program, funded by higher gasoline taxes and higher vehicle-registration fees.

More details on the history, need, and action below:

• Most CTA rail lines have stations every 1/2-mile. However, on the Green Line, there is a 1-mile gap between the California Ave. and Damen Ave. stations. Western Ave. is between these stations, and a station should be built here.
• All CTA lines that cross Western Ave. today - the Brown, Blue, Pink, and Orange Lines - have Western stations. The Green Line does not, and this is a glaring CTA service deficiency.
• Most CTA lines have nearby parallel CTA buses within 1/8-mile to move riders between stations. Not the Green Line. City Hall cut the CTA Lake St. bus in 1997.
• Western Ave. carries more CTA bus riders than any other street, 21,000 riders/day, according to 2024 CTA data shown at westernavestation.com. These riders have no Green Line train service connection to Chicago's West Side, downtown, or South Side. In 2014, FMA led the effort to restore the CTA Western Ave. express bus, which is used by about 4,000 daily riders.
• Western is Chicago's longest street at 24 miles and carries arguably the most daily vehicles, estimated at 30,000/day. A new Western station would increase CTA riders, reduce people's use of vehicles, and improve Chicago's environment.
• Compared to 2019, CTA riders are down 30%, according to CTA. Last year, Chicagoans were forced by Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker and state lawmakers to pay higher sales taxes and higher tollway fees to keep CTA alive financially. Now, a new Western station would generate new CTA riders and revenues, and ideally help reverse the punitive new taxes and tollway fees.
• For thousands of residents in the Near West Side and Garfield Park areas, there is one full-service grocery store: Pete's Fresh Market at Western and Madison. People need a Western Ave. station to get groceries home, especially seniors and low income families.
• Mayor Johnson and 27th Ward Alderman Burnett III should approve this station immediately, along with the CTA board, which is controlled by the mayor.
• The Green Line runs from the Village of Oak Park and Chicago's West Side neighborhoods on the west, to Chicago's Fulton Market, West Loop, and downtown in the center, to Chicago's McCormick Place convention center and South Side neighborhoods on the south.

For more information, including CTA and City of Chicago maps and statistics, go to westernavestation.com.

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