Division station on February 23, 1951. Here, a VIP tour of the new subway is being lead on newly-delivered car 6101-6102. The man facing right at the foot of the stairs is George DeMent, Commissioner of Subways and Superhighways and later a CTA chairman. (Photo from the George Krambles Collection.)

Division (1200N/1600W)
Division Street, Ashland Avenue and Milwaukee Avenue, Wicker Park/Noble Square (West Town)

Service Notes:

Blue Line: Milwaukee-Dearborn Subway

Owl Service

Quick Facts:

Address: 1200 N. Milwaukee Avenue
Established: February 25, 1951
Original Line: Milwaukee-Dearborn Subway
Previous Names: none

Skip-Stop Type:

Station (1951, A/B service annulled after one AM rush period)

Station (1958-1995)
Rebuilt: n/a
Status: In Use

History:

Division/Milwaukee is typical of the downtown Dearborn and State Street subway stations. Described at the time as of a "modern design" (really somewhere between art deco and art moderne), the mezzanine station has smooth concrete floors and ceilings and white glazed tile walls (sometimes referred to as "structural glass"). The fare control booths are made of stone walls with a small ventilation grate near the bottom and glass windows on all four sides. Turnstiles were steel.

The island platform has red no-slip concrete floors, curved concrete ceilings and I-beam steel columns. Fluorescent lights and illuminated station signs hanging from the ceilings originally finished the decoration. When compared to the ornate subways of New York, London or Paris (built at least several decades before), these stations and their simple, deco-style designs may seem starkly utilitarian but they are very much a product of their era. Though much of the structural work of the Dearborn Subway subway was concurrent with that of State Street's (which opened in 1943), the Dearborn line's was held up until 1951 due to wartime materials shortages. Even then, it was only open at the north end, with cars forced to turn around at LaSalle/Congress until the south end's completion years later.

In September 2004, Dunkin' Donuts, the coffee and baked goods chain, broke ground on seven new concessions in CTA® stations around the "L" system. One such new concession was located at Division station. "This is the first major concerted effort to open a significant number of Dunkin' Donuts stores in CTA® stations," said Mike Lavigne, director of development for Dunkin' Donuts. All new Dunkin' Donuts CTA® station stores were scheduled to be full-service. The new concession opened in 2005.

 

This Chicago-L.org article is a stub. It will be expanded in the future as resources allow.

 

division-milwaukee_signSB.jpg (68k)
Circa the 1980s, when Division station received KDR-type signage, the platform columns received these "symbol signs". This sign contains several things that are now out-of-date, including mention of A/B skip-stop service and the former names of the two terminals (changed in the 1990s). (Sign from the Andrew Stiffler Collection)