Chicago "L"
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50 free Chicago "L" trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Chicago's trains have been rattling above, beside and beneath the city since 1892, and they still shape how the place looks and sounds. The tracks ring downtown, thread between apartment buildings, dive under the river and ride the middle of expressways, and almost every neighborhood has a station with a story attached. This quiz covers the whole CTA train system: the Green Line and the Pink Line, the other color-coded routes, the Loop, the stops beside ballparks, museums and airports, and the people and machines that built it all. There are questions on history, on trains in the movies, and on which station you need for which landmark. It is written for daily riders, transit fans, Chicagoans who want to test how well they know their stops, and visitors planning a trip. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you will finish knowing the system better than when you boarded.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Chicago's rapid transit trains, running since 1892, are nicknamed the "L" as short for which word?
Elevated
Elevated is the word, because the first lines ran on structures built above the city's streets and alleys. Parts of the system now run in subways and expressway medians, but the name stuck.
Q 02Which superhero sequel filmed its runaway-train fight on the Chicago "L"?
Spider-Man 2
Spider-Man 2 needed tracks high above the street for its battle with Doctor Octopus, and Manhattan has very few. The crew shot in Chicago's Loop for two days in November 2002.
Q 03In March 2014, a CTA Blue Line train overran the end of the track at O'Hare and climbed what?
An escalator
An escalator at the end of the platform caught the lead car after it jumped the bumper block. The operator had fallen asleep at the controls, and 34 people were injured.
Q 04Which CTA Red Line station on Chicago's North Side directly serves Wrigley Field, home of the Cubs?
Addison
Addison gets so crowded after Cubs games that many fans walk to the next station north, Sheridan, to board there instead.
Q 05In which romantic comedy does Sandra Bullock play a lonely fare collector on the Chicago "L"?
While You Were Sleeping
While You Were Sleeping opens with Lucy in her token booth on Christmas Day, when she rescues a commuter who has been pushed onto the tracks.
Q 06The CTA Orange Line, opened in 1993, links the Chicago Loop with which Southwest Side airport?
Midway International
Midway International gained its rail link on October 31, 1993, with tracks laid along existing railroad corridors.
Q 07Whose votes in a 2006 essay contest gave the CTA Pink Line its color name over gold and silver?
Schoolchildren
Schoolchildren from kindergarten to eighth grade sent in their choices, and one young essay writer who argued for pink won a $1,000 savings bond.
Q 08Which Chicago building, owned for decades by the Kennedy family, has its own Brown Line station?
Merchandise Mart
Merchandise Mart was the largest building in the world when it opened in 1930, with about four million square feet of floor space.
Q 09What pulled the wooden coaches of the first Chicago "L" trains when service began in 1892?
Steam locomotives
Steam locomotives hauled the South Side line's trains for its first six years, until it switched to electric power in 1898.
Q 10Which Chicago team plays beside the CTA Red Line station at 35th Street on the South Side?
The White Sox
The White Sox ballpark is next door, and the stop first served old Comiskey Park, which stood across the street until it was demolished.
Q 11The South Side "L" was extended to Jackson Park in 1893 to carry crowds to which event in Chicago?
World's Columbian Exposition
World's Columbian Exposition crowds rode straight to the fairgrounds, where a short electric railway inside the fair showed that such trains were practical.
Q 12Which city has the only rapid transit system in the Americas older than the Chicago "L" of 1892?
New York
New York had a railway running above Greenwich Street as early as 1868. Boston, a common guess, opened North America's oldest subway tunnel only in 1897.
Q 13Chicago "L" trains draw their 600-volt direct current from what, instead of overhead wires?
A third rail
Q 21The CTA Pink Line's mural-covered 18th Street stop serves which Mexican-American neighborhood?
Pilsen
Pilsen takes its name from the Czech city of Plzeň, a reminder of the Czech immigrants who lived there before it became predominantly Mexican-American.
Q 22The CTA Pink Line ends at 54th/Cermak in which suburb, where Al Capone once based his operations?
Cicero
Cicero became Capone's refuge when he moved there to escape the reach of Chicago police. It is the only suburb the Pink Line enters.
Q 23The CTA Yellow Line began in 1964 as a nonstop "Swift" shuttle to which northern suburb?
Skokie
Skokie got its Swift as a two-year federal experiment, and so many people rode it that the CTA made the shuttle a permanent part of the system.
A third rail beside the running rails feeds every train, and it is left uncovered. Newer cars even send power back into it when they brake.
Q 14The CTA Purple Line serves which university, whose official school color it shares?
Northwestern
Northwestern has purple as its official color, which is thought to be why the old Evanston Line was given that name when color coding arrived in 1993.
Q 15A CTA Green Line station opened at Cermak Road in 2015 to serve which lakefront destination?
McCormick Place
McCormick Place got its own stop after Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced the project in 2012. The platforms sit inside a steel tube that works as a windbreak.
Q 16The CTA Green Line's Damen station opened in 2024 chiefly to serve which West Side sports arena?
United Center
United Center crowds now step off where one of the original Lake Street line stations stood from 1893 until 1948.
Q 17A platform about 3,500 feet long links three Red Line stations under which Chicago thoroughfare?
State Street
State Street has had a subway beneath it since October 1943, and riders can walk underground from Lake to Jackson without leaving the platform.
Q 18The CTA Green Line runs west from the Loop into which suburb known for Frank Lloyd Wright houses?
Oak Park
Oak Park is where Wright settled in 1889 and built his home and studio. Trains there ran along the ground until the 1960s, when the tracks were lifted onto a railroad embankment.
Q 19South of Chinatown, CTA Red Line trains run down the middle of which Chicago expressway?
Dan Ryan
Dan Ryan trains began running in the highway's median in September 1969, on one of three branches the CTA laid along freeways after World War II.
Q 20Which fare card, launched in 2013, replaced the Chicago Card on CTA trains and buses?
Ventra
Ventra is said to be Latin for windy, although the actual Latin word is ventosa. The card also works on suburban Pace buses.
Q 24Which station at Chicago's northern edge is where the CTA Red, Purple and Yellow lines meet?
Howard
Howard sits just south of the Evanston border, and it is the end of the line for Red Line trains coming up from the South Side.
Q 25Which Chicago mayor's name is carried by a Loop "L" station beside the city's central library?
Harold Washington
Harold Washington backed the new central library after his election in 1983, and the stop outside was later renamed to match the building.
Q 26The CTA Green Line's Conservatory stop is named for a glasshouse garden in which West Side park?
Garfield
Garfield Park Conservatory stands just outside the station, which replaced an older stop two blocks to the east.
Q 27The CTA Blue Line's Damen station, the oldest on the line, serves Bucktown and which neighborhood?
Wicker Park
Wicker Park's stop opened in 1895 under the name Robey, and it is one of the few stations left from the original Metropolitan West Side company.
Q 28In which thriller is Harrison Ford's Dr. Richard Kimble attacked aboard a Chicago "L" train?
The Fugitive
The Fugitive has its hunted surgeon attacked on the train by Sykes, the man he has identified as his wife's killer.
Q 29The CTA Holiday Train carries Santa and his sleigh around Chicago each winter on what kind of car?
A flatcar
A flatcar sits open to the weather in the middle of the train, with Santa waving from a sleigh on top. The tradition began in 1992 as a way for CTA staff to deliver food to charities.
Q 30Which tech giant refurbished the CTA's North/Clybourn station in return for its advertising rights?
Apple
Apple agreed in 2009 to spend up to about $3.9 million on the Red Line station and its bus turnaround, and held the advertising rights for nearly ten years.