UP line to St. Louis

[eolafan]

Yesterday I drove round trip from Chicago to Springfield, IL and so was paralelling the old GM&O (now U.P.) from Chicago to St. Louis for quite a way. This is the route where Amtrak ran the 100 mph plus test train recently. I saw manyb signs of new signalling (replacing old position list signials with new searchlight signials complete with hoods for better visability, new bridges (concrete replacing old wooden beam construction), new ballast and some track, but NO TRAINS! All the way down and back the only train I saw was the Texas Eagle (two Genesis units, a baggage car and five Superliners) southbound about fifteen miles south of Bloomington. With all of this track and infrastructure work, where are all the trains, I was sure I would see some more than one!

[David3]

Freights are very hard to see on this line, but if you do see one it will mostly be an intermodal train.

[Anonymous]

This line is predominately a passenger operation. Amtrak runs 6 trains a day on this line. UP only runs a local north of Bloomington, IL to Joliet and back. a STL-Bloomington manifest MASBN and MBNAS to feed the industries on this line and a Bloomington -Springfield local. Between STL and Springfield you might find an occasional coal train and a STL-Proviso freight MASPR-MPRAS and maybe an auto rack train. There are no concrete ties on this line everything that was replaced was wooden ties. Yes new signals are going in to replace the old B&O type signals. All this work is being done for the use of High Speed 110 mph passenger trains. Some of us who work on this line DON'T want to see freight trains out here as all they do is delay Amtrak.

[Anonymous]

Union Pacific was train washing a few refrigerated cars in the Mississippi by Jefferson City this weekend so Amtrak was shut down for a couple days.

http://newstribune.com/stories/051803/loc_0518030965.asp