Metra cuts bathrooms to add seats

Here's a little irony for your commute: Metra is reducing the number of bathrooms on trains, while the number of passengers, including seniors riding free, is on the rise.

To add more seating, Metra will cut the number of diesel cars equipped with bathrooms to 50 percent from 65 percent over the next four to five years. Metra will take out the tiny bathrooms, which aren't handicapped accessible, as it rehabs cars, to add six seats. New cars also will keep to the 50 percent ratio.

"Frankly, I have the feeling that the customers will hardly notice," executive director Philip Pagano said after a Metra board meeting Wednesday. The decision was prompted by increased crowding on …