Metra is taking the rare step of applying for a loan to help quicken the pace of fixing its hundreds of aging bridges.The commuter rail agency is seeking $230 million from the federal Railroad Rehabilitation & Improvement Financing program to pay for replacing 17 bridges in the Chicago area, Metra announced Wednesday. Eleven of those bridges are on the Union Pacific North line between Fullerton Avenue and Addison Street.The loan, which Metra said could take a year to obtain, would be paid off with normal operating funds at $15 million to $20 million a year.Metra typically pays for bridge repair and construction through a capital program funded by local, state and federal sources. But its needs are far greater than available funding, Metra said.In its five-year capital plan for 2025-29, Metra said it needs $5.4 billion but only has $2.1 billion in available funding. Metra said it is seeking the federal loan instead of issuing revenue bonds because the federal loan offers lower interest rates and has longer and more forgiving repayment terms.“There is no way around it — these bridges must be replaced, and they must be replaced soon, before our operations are impacted,” Metra Executive Director/CEO Jim Derwinski said in a statement. “Because this need is so urgent, we believe we must explore all our options, including financing, to address it.”Metra owns 446 of the 926 bridges that its trains cross daily. Metra said half of its bridges are more than 100 years old, while nearly another third are more than 75 years old — the typical lifespan of a bridge. The older bridges are safe but are expensive to maintain, according to Metra.The announcement comes as Metra and other area transit agencies are asking legislators in Springfield to dramatically increase transit funding. Metra, Chicago Transit Authority and Pace have said they will run out of federal COVID-19 grants in 2026 and may have to consider steep cuts in service in the face of operating deficits. The transit agencies are seeking an additional $1.5 billion in state funding.The Regional Transportation Authority, which oversees the three transit agencies, wants to increase its authority over the agencies as an alternative to merging them into one agency, which has been proposed in the Metropolitan Mobility Authority Act.