State Street is a great street. So it certainly deserves a splashy station, especially one promising room to move, natural light shining through a glass canopy and elevated vistas allowing Chicagoans to check whether or not there are people there doing things they don’t do on Broadway.

But $444 million? And a construction time of three years, beginning Jan. 5? That’s not a concept-to-opening time, but simple demo and construction. To build a design that was unveiled four years ago.

When this new station, designed by TranSystems and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, was announced in 2021 by Mayor Lori Lightfoot, the cost was announced as $180 million. Now, we’re told, it’s a mind-blowing $444 million. For one previously existing station. Stunning. We doubt your paycheck increased at that rate.

We like the pizzazz of the new State and Lake, at least on paper, and perhaps all of that highly visible glass will improve safety. Still, it’s a very contemporary style arguably at odds with the historic nature of many of the other Loop stations.

Quincy, a lovely historic station in the Loop, was renovated in classic style in 2016 for, wait for it, a very reasonable $18 million, which is less than 5% of what is being spent on State and Lake. “The improvements will preserve the original appearance of the Loop ‘L’ station while upgrading the station with the addition of two elevators to make the station accessible to customers with disabilities,” the CTA said at the time, noting that the renovation would also feature “stair replacement, painting, lighting improvements and more.” We use Quincy often as it is by our office. It’s a real charmer with elevators that are easy to use, if need be.

When it was pushing the new Quincy the CTA was touting its history. Explaining State and Lake, we’re now told a 130-year-old station just can’t do the job. Not a problem a few blocks away.

Obviously time has gone on and no two stations are identical, but there is one heck of a difference between $18 million and $444 million, even allowing for the romance of State Street, which we fully embrace. Pretty much the same trains, after all, stop at both Quincy and State and Lake, although the busier latter also has the Green Line trundling through.

We wonder if, with hindsight, this plan was just a tad too luxe for a financially strapped city. And, yes, we know the bulk of the money behind the new station is coming from the feds; that does not change our view.

For CTA riders who use State and Lake, alternates are not far away, but drivers, bus passengers, cyclists and pedestrians also are likely to see closures and tie-ups around the busy area of the station for, yes, three years. How about some new project czar, reassigned but not hired by the city, knocks a few heads together and suggests that two years is all a city exhausted from the Kennedy reconstruction can handle? And maybe knocks off another million from the construction costs while doing so.

We’re not surprised this start-of-construction announcement came after the so-called fiscal cliff crisis, when numbers like $444 million in construction costs might well have raised some eyebrows in Springfield, given that the RTA was eventually saying its budget deficit for 2026 was $250 million, little more than half the cost of this one station. And, yes, we know these are different pots of money, but most of our readers will see our point.

Smart political timing is not what matters; it’s quick, efficient and cost-effective construction we care about here.

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https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/08/editorial-state-and-lake-street-cta-station-project/