Logan Square branch

Logan Square branch
Logan Square branch
	The Logan Square terminal in 1969
Overview
Status	Partially replaced
Owner	Chicago Transit Authority (1947–present); Chicago Rapid Transit Company (1924–1947); Metropolitan West Side Elevated Railroad (1895–1924)
Stations	9 (pre-1951, not including Marshfield); 3 (surviving as of 2022, not including the post-1970 Logan Square station)
Service
Type	Rapid transit
System	Chicago 'L'
Services	Blue Pink
History
Opened	May 6, 1895; 129 years ago
Paulina Connector closed	February 25, 1951; 73 years ago
Technical
Number of tracks	2
Character	Elevated
Track gauge	4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)
Electrification	Third rail, 600 V DC
Operating speed	16 mph (26 km/h) (1895)
Route map
Route map
	Legend
	Logan Square
	relocated 1970
	This diagram: view; talk; edit;

The Logan Square branch was an elevated rapid transit line of the Chicago "L", where it was one of the branches of the Metropolitan West Side Elevated Railroad. Diverging north from the Metropolitan's main line west of Marshfield station, it opened in 1895 and served Chicago's Logan Square and West Town neighborhoods. North of Damen station, the Humboldt Park branch diverged from the Logan Square branch, going west to serve Humboldt Park. The original Logan Square branch was separated into several sections in 1951, some of which remain in revenue service as of 2023^[update].

What history remembers as the "Logan Square branch" was actually the combination of two routes. Diverging from Marshfield was the Metropolitan's Northwest branch, proceeding northward and northwestward to Damen. The Northwest branch then split into the Humboldt Park branch and the Logan Square branch proper. As early as 1898, however, even the Metropolitan itself considered the Northwest branch as part of the "Logan Square branch", although ridership statistics continued to separate them.

The Northwest branch and main line were the first Metropolitan lines to open, entering service on May 6, 1895; combined, they were the first revenue electric elevated railroad in the United States. The Logan Square branch proper followed on May 25, and the Humboldt Park branch opened on July 29. The Metropolitan continued to operate its lines, with some interruptions and difficulties, until it handed control over to the Chicago Elevated Railways (CER) trust in 1911 and formally merged into the Chicago Rapid Transit Company (CRT) in 1924. The Milwaukee-Dearborn Subway was proposed in the late 1930s to provide more direct service from Logan Square to downtown. The old elevated lines were originally intended to continue revenue operation alongside this subway. The publicly-owned Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), which had assumed control of the "L" in 1947, decided to instead discontinue service on the elevated lines with the opening of the subway.

The subway opened in 1951, splitting the original branch into two sections. The branch north of the subway's entrance continued in revenue service as the "Milwaukee branch" and, after the closure of the Humboldt Park branch and extensions in 1970 and the early 1980s, currently serves as the O'Hare branch of the Blue Line; the 1970 extension entailed the replacement of the original Logan Square terminal with a new subway through-station. The branch south of the subway, having been rendered obsolete, nevertheless served as the only link of the surviving branch to the rest of the "L" system and was kept in non-revenue operation as the Paulina Connector. After half a century, and the demolition of its northern half, the Connector re-entered revenue service in 2006 as part of the Pink Line.
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