Station Review #113: 27th Street (Metra)
27th Street is a station on Metra's Electric District line. The station is the least used Metra station, and possibly one of the least used train stations in the midwestern US. History Not much is known about the original history of the station, though it's assumed to have first been built sometime around the 1870s. On October 30th, 1972, the 1972 Chicago Rail Crash happened at this station, the worst crash in all of Chicago's history, with 45 deaths and 322 injuries. The station was originally made to serve Michael Reese Hospital, with the hospital having been directly connected to 27th Street station. Michael Reese Hospital went out of business in 2008, and was demolished. Chicago tried to build an Olympic Village at the site of the former hospital for the 2016 Olympic Games, but this failed. This is because of two important factors: staunch opposition from residents, and radioactive waste buried between the former hospital and the station, and a...