If anybody could suggest a school in the LA, SFO, Newark or Chicago area that can do pre check ride preparation and check ride I would be grateful for some contacts.
Try the school that is run through sporty's pilot shop. They advertise doing the ATP-MEL flight test in a Duchess or some other light twin.
I've just done the ATP-CTP through CAE in Dallas, sat the written the following day and now I'm doing my indoc/training at a regional for the type ride/ATP.
As previously mentioned, the ATP-CTP does NOT prep you for the ATP written at all. Fortunately I knew this in advance and used the Dauntless prep software a couple of weeks in advance (same as Sheppard Air).
The ATP-CTP is a no fail course. A bunch of people thought it was a waste of time, but I definitely did get a lot out of it especially because at CAE they keep you in the same sim type for all sorties for continuity.
**Note; make sure you get your TSA stuff completed way in advance, as the TSA is really backlogged getting the approvals through with so many people requiring the ATP-CTP course in addition to their normal workload of applications.
Good luck.