River Forest station
River Forest is a Metra commuter railroad station in River Forest, Illinois, a western suburb of Chicago, on the Union Pacific West Line. Trains go east to Ogilvie Transportation Center in Chicago and as far west as Elburn, Illinois. Travel time to Ogilvie is 20 to 24 minutes. As of 2018, River Forest is the 107th busiest of the 236 non-downtown stations in the Metra system, with an average of 448 weekday boardings.[1] Unless otherwise announced, inbound trains use the north (side) platform and outbound trains use the south (island) platform.
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 River Forest station in September 2006. | ||||||||||||||||||
| General information | ||||||||||||||||||
| Location | 8001 West Central Street, River Forest, Illinois 60305 | |||||||||||||||||
| Coordinates | 41.8870°N 87.8249°W | |||||||||||||||||
| Owned by | Union Pacific | |||||||||||||||||
| Platforms | 1 side platform (formerly 2) 1 island platform | |||||||||||||||||
| Tracks | 3 (formerly 4) | |||||||||||||||||
| Connections | Pace | |||||||||||||||||
| Construction | ||||||||||||||||||
| Accessible | No | |||||||||||||||||
| Other information | ||||||||||||||||||
| Fare zone | B | |||||||||||||||||
| History | ||||||||||||||||||
| Opened | 1915 | |||||||||||||||||
| Passengers | ||||||||||||||||||
| 2018 | 448 (average weekday)[1]  2.3% | |||||||||||||||||
| Rank | 107 out of 236[1] | |||||||||||||||||
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As of May 30, 2023, River Forest is served by 43 trains (21 inbound, 22 outbound) on weekdays, by all 20 trains (10 in each direction) on Saturdays, and by all 18 trains (nine in each direction) on Sundays and holidays.
The station is at Central Avenue and Thatcher Avenue. The surrounding neighborhood is mostly characterized by single-family homes, baseball fields and tennis courts. Pace suburban buses stop one block to the north on Lake Street. To the east is an overpass that carries the Canadian National Railway's Waukesha Subdivision into Forest Park where the line rechristens itself to the CSX Altenheim Subdivision (B&OCT).
The station building was originally built in 1915 by the Chicago and North Western Railway and is also the River Forest Park District headquarters.
The station has recently undergone renovations. The inbound platform was rebuilt along with the stairways.
References
- "Commuter Rail System Station Boarding/Alighting Count: Summary Results Fall 2018" (PDF). metrarail.com. April 2019. Archived from the original (PDF) on 26 May 2019.