schlimm Yes, it is (always has been) called the Clybourn stop for both the UP-North and UP-Northwest lines. I don't think changing there instead of Ogilvie makes sense now, as the schedules have changed, but I recall doing the same thing years ago when the lines were the CNW Kenosha and Harvard Divisions.
Yes, it is (always has been) called the Clybourn stop for both the UP-North and UP-Northwest lines. I don't think changing there instead of Ogilvie makes sense now, as the schedules have changed, but I recall doing the same thing years ago when the lines were the CNW Kenosha and Harvard Divisions.
Changing at Clybourn still is done and necessary for midday transfers from UPN>UPNW and leaves only 5 min for UPNW>UPN if the arriving train is on time. A similar situation may exist at Western Av for MD and NCS trains; but I'm not going to refresh my memory now.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
You are there an know it. I'm remembering something 15 years ago, so you must be right . I think the issue was that Clayborne has a simple unprotected platform(s?) and I might have been blown off onto the tracks by the force of the wind! It is the first station north of the Chiago terminal, before the Harvard line and the Kenosha (Milwaukee - Twin Cities in the old bygon days) separate.
HarveyK400 daveklepper: planning to connect to the Harvard train at Clyde, riding the front end and looking through the train-dor window. Privacy matters.
daveklepper: planning to connect to the Harvard train at Clyde, riding the front end and looking through the train-dor window.
planning to connect to the Harvard train at Clyde, riding the front end and looking through the train-dor window.
Privacy matters.
I'm assuming you meant Clybourn, as Clyde Ave. is on the SE side of Chicago.
daveklepper Visited Rockford on a business trip some 15 years ago. Intersting trip, from NYC, visiting both Glencoe, IL, and Rockford. Used Amtrak's Lake Shore to Chicago, roomette, then walked to the C&NW in the snow with heavy luggage. Met by client at the Glencoe station, back there in the afternoon, planning to connect to the Harvard train at Clyde, riding the front end and looking through the train-dor window. With the blizzard conditions, the conductor told me to stay on the train to the Chicago station, and he would tell the dispatcher I wished to the make the two-minute connection there. Worked fine, the train was on-time, and I boarded with out any delay to the Harvard train (right across the platform), and was met by my client at Harvard for the nightime snowy drive to Rockford. I had two facing seats on the lower level of the galary car and with suitcases between slept most of the way. The next day my client insisted on driving me all the way back to Union Station, Chicago, with plenty of time to catch the eastbound Lake Shore, because there were other matters to discuss and we could talk on the way.
Visited Rockford on a business trip some 15 years ago. Intersting trip, from NYC, visiting both Glencoe, IL, and Rockford. Used Amtrak's Lake Shore to Chicago, roomette, then walked to the C&NW in the snow with heavy luggage. Met by client at the Glencoe station, back there in the afternoon, planning to connect to the Harvard train at Clyde, riding the front end and looking through the train-dor window. With the blizzard conditions, the conductor told me to stay on the train to the Chicago station, and he would tell the dispatcher I wished to the make the two-minute connection there. Worked fine, the train was on-time, and I boarded with out any delay to the Harvard train (right across the platform), and was met by my client at Harvard for the nightime snowy drive to Rockford. I had two facing seats on the lower level of the galary car and with suitcases between slept most of the way. The next day my client insisted on driving me all the way back to Union Station, Chicago, with plenty of time to catch the eastbound Lake Shore, because there were other matters to discuss and we could talk on the way.
Grew up in Rockford. If you know Rockford's history, you know it finds its own unique way out of its problems. Doesn't care much about what the outside world thinks of it. Fine furniture manufacturing became high-level machine tool manufacturing. Now a growing hub of aerospace manufacturing. Is competing with Houston as new location for aerospace and aeronautical engineering college. Is UPS Air hub. Fiat has announced large investment in Belvidere Chrysler plant to build Fiat architecture compact cars there. Nippon is building it's passenger rail manufacturing facility in Rochelle, 30 miles south.
I've given my thoughts about train service to Chicago in previous threads when this route has been brought up. I'm thinking now that Illinois-sponsored train service ideas could easily be moot since de-leveraging Illinois' massive, untenable debt situation will probably wipe most of it out.
Wdlgln005 I still think the best route for N iowa & Illinois would be on the C&NW/UP route. Better track at higher speeds to Ames & Omaha. This may even be a better route to serve Des Moines with a daily streamliner. You have to wonder if Iowa has enough traffic to divert from i-80 to support trains on CB&Q, RI, etc.
I still think the best route for N iowa & Illinois would be on the C&NW/UP route. Better track at higher speeds to Ames & Omaha. This may even be a better route to serve Des Moines with a daily streamliner.
You have to wonder if Iowa has enough traffic to divert from i-80 to support trains on CB&Q, RI, etc.
The BNSF to East Dubuque would combine with other Amtrak services at Naperville. Unfortunately the 2.5 miles up Ferry Rd to downtown Galena is not considered walking distance.
The UP-W/BNSF to East Dubuque via De Kalb would be an interesting alternative as well.
The UP would facilitate a Clinton-Cedar Rapids-Waterloo-Mason City route as well as a fast Clinton-Cedar Rapids-Marshalltown-Des Moines route. The only stop of any consequence between Marshalltown and Council Bluffs is Ames.
I would like to put in a plug for Lincoln as the starting point rather than Omaha for a route to Chicago; and there really isn't much of an alternative than to go through Des Moines and Iowa City. This Lincoln-Chicago train would work with a Des Moines train over the UP and an early train originating at Iowa City as proposed, extending the outbound r/t to Iowa City. This would supplement the CZ through Ottumwa and Burlington.
As far as I-80 is concerned, I imagine it's wall-to-wall trucks across Iowa and Illinois most of the day and worse getting into Chicago; and I-88 is a toll road east from Dixon.
If there is to be a service in NW Illinois and NE Iowa (which still seems foolish), it should access as many population centers and/or places that people travel to for getaways (like Galena, & maybe Dubuque, which I know is an interesting town that draws folks, mostly the same ones who go the Galena). But if Waterloo is such a potential market for travelers, why isn't the Iowa DOT clamoring for a route? The entire stretch from Rockford to Waterloo would be best served, if that had to be, by a limited weekend services, much like the CNW had years ago in northern Wisconsin - the weekends only, Wisconsin Lakes Special.
As it is, the Rockford - Chicago "service" only serves downtown Chicago and maybe Elmhurst, and would miss the rest of the metro area. No one in the western and northwest suburbs is going to drive to Genoa to take the train and not many would drive to Elmhurst to board.
schlimm Yes. My experience was that many people in Belvidere and Rockford were commuting to jobs in Schaumburg and Elk Grove Village. A fast service connecting with site-specific PACE or private shuttle buses might work. As to Waterloo, even if you use the entire populations of the counties between it and Dubuque County, it still is a very small number of people. Black Hawk, Bremen and Grundy counties = 165K; Delaware County = 18K. The fact that Chicago is the magnet at the other end is irrelevant. Chicagoans and suburbanites are unlikely to be traveling to any of those counties in numbers with any regularity. Or are you talking connecting the Iowa Counties, including Dubuque County (pop. 93K) ? If so, let Iowa ask for service on that route. The gravity model makes no sense, IMO, and is only used when a demographic model would rule out service. My whole point is that given limited resources, train services should be added or expanded only where there is a real market. Sure, if we had unlimited money available, we could have trains running from Galena to Madison, WI. but we don't have that luxury of waste. The Black Hawk service just won't hunt. It was a failure in the 1970's and still will be in 2014.
Yes. My experience was that many people in Belvidere and Rockford were commuting to jobs in Schaumburg and Elk Grove Village. A fast service connecting with site-specific PACE or private shuttle buses might work.
As to Waterloo, even if you use the entire populations of the counties between it and Dubuque County, it still is a very small number of people. Black Hawk, Bremen and Grundy counties = 165K; Delaware County = 18K. The fact that Chicago is the magnet at the other end is irrelevant. Chicagoans and suburbanites are unlikely to be traveling to any of those counties in numbers with any regularity. Or are you talking connecting the Iowa Counties, including Dubuque County (pop. 93K) ? If so, let Iowa ask for service on that route. The gravity model makes no sense, IMO, and is only used when a demographic model would rule out service.
My whole point is that given limited resources, train services should be added or expanded only where there is a real market. Sure, if we had unlimited money available, we could have trains running from Galena to Madison, WI. but we don't have that luxury of waste. The Black Hawk service just won't hunt. It was a failure in the 1970's and still will be in 2014.
There is a market for Waterloo - whether it's big enough for an extended train route or connecting bus like in California is the question. Part of the desire for rail service in addition to Ramsguy's I'm guessing may be the lack of air or bus service. Another factor may be the hope of an economic stimulus at some level with the rail connection to Chicago.
Gravity models account for the effect that intercity trip generation rates are disproportionately higher for small towns and cities than for larger cities and metro areas.
By the time the State tried to resuscitate the Black Hawk, track condition was pretty bad. As I recall, 60 mph was the top speed where there weren't slow orders, and it took almost an hour to get from Chicago to Elmhurst. This wasn't your grandfathers 79 mph railroad. The worn out and unreliable RDC'c didn't help either. A shoe-string operating budget wasn't going to do it; and there was insufficient support to commit any significant investment in the Black Hawk (and Rockets).
As noted by others, there were faster motor coach services to O'Hare and Downtown, even with traffic congestion that often took as long as the train to get out of the city.
schlimm HarveyK400: From what I've gleaned, there is a parallel effort to implement a commuter service between Rockford and the job-rich Northwest suburbs including areas around O'Hare Airport. With employment tumbling in Rockford and jobs in the Chicago suburbs, there is a market for train service. This is where most of the early morning traffic on I-90 is headed, not so much to downtown Chicago. As for a Waterloo extension, county population is more indicative of the catchment for intercity rail passenger service. And ridership is more related to the probability of travel between each pair of populations on the route and inversely proportional to distance than to the population for each community. This is the basis for so=called "gravity models." So the ridership from the populations of Waterloo and Independence is greatly affected by the population of Chicago and parts thereof. Yes. My experience was that many people in Belvidere and Rockford were commuting to jobs in Schaumburg and Elk Grove Village. A fast service connecting with site-specific PACE or private shuttle buses might work. As to Waterloo, even if you use the entire populations of the counties between it and Dubuque County, it still is a very small number of people. Black Hawk, Bremen and Grundy counties = 165K; Delaware County = 18K. The fact that Chicago is the magnet at the other end is irrelevant. Chicagoans and suburbanites are unlikely to be traveling to any of those counties in numbers with any regularity. Or are you talking connecting the Iowa Counties, including Dubuque County (pop. 93K) ? If so, let Iowa ask for service on that route. The gravity model makes no sense, IMO, and is only used when a demographic model would rule out service. My whole point is that given limited resources, train services should be added or expanded only where there is a real market. Sure, if we had unlimited money available, we could have trains running from Galena to Madison, WI. but we don't have that luxury of waste. The Black Hawk service just won't hunt. It was a failure in the 1970's and still will be in 2014.
HarveyK400: From what I've gleaned, there is a parallel effort to implement a commuter service between Rockford and the job-rich Northwest suburbs including areas around O'Hare Airport. With employment tumbling in Rockford and jobs in the Chicago suburbs, there is a market for train service. This is where most of the early morning traffic on I-90 is headed, not so much to downtown Chicago. As for a Waterloo extension, county population is more indicative of the catchment for intercity rail passenger service. And ridership is more related to the probability of travel between each pair of populations on the route and inversely proportional to distance than to the population for each community. This is the basis for so=called "gravity models." So the ridership from the populations of Waterloo and Independence is greatly affected by the population of Chicago and parts thereof.
From what I've gleaned, there is a parallel effort to implement a commuter service between Rockford and the job-rich Northwest suburbs including areas around O'Hare Airport. With employment tumbling in Rockford and jobs in the Chicago suburbs, there is a market for train service. This is where most of the early morning traffic on I-90 is headed, not so much to downtown Chicago.
As for a Waterloo extension, county population is more indicative of the catchment for intercity rail passenger service. And ridership is more related to the probability of travel between each pair of populations on the route and inversely proportional to distance than to the population for each community. This is the basis for so=called "gravity models." So the ridership from the populations of Waterloo and Independence is greatly affected by the population of Chicago and parts thereof.
I have to respectfully disagree with your assessment that the re-institution of the Black Hawk will not be a successful one; particularly with your views on extension from Dubuque to Waterloo. Keep in mind, things have changed dramatically as far as Dubuque is concerned. What was once an old and run-down dumpy river town, Dubuque has undergone a dramatic make-over with a swanky casino and hotel that draws great numbers; particularly in the spring, summer and fall months. Ditto for Galena which is a huge attraction with all its shops and restaurants/bars downtown that draw people from not only the Chicago area but also from Eastern Iowa as well (not to mention southern Wisconsin). That in mind, I'm willing to bet new service will be a winner and extension to Waterloo would work as well. You're not only drawing numbers from on-line communities such as Dyersville, Manchester and Independence but also surrounding nearby communities as well (Cedar Rapids/Marion, Oelwein, Cascade just to name a few).
HarveyK400 From what I've gleaned, there is a parallel effort to implement a commuter service between Rockford and the job-rich Northwest suburbs including areas around O'Hare Airport. With employment tumbling in Rockford and jobs in the Chicago suburbs, there is a market for train service. This is where most of the early morning traffic on I-90 is headed, not so much to downtown Chicago. As for a Waterloo extension, county population is more indicative of the catchment for intercity rail passenger service. And ridership is more related to the probability of travel between each pair of populations on the route and inversely proportional to distance than to the population for each community. This is the basis for so=called "gravity models." So the ridership from the populations of Waterloo and Independence is greatly affected by the population of Chicago and parts thereof.
If the shift starts at 7 or 6 and allowing for a presumed shuttle between the train and destination, that makes for a very early departure from Rockford. In addition, suburban office hours tend to be earlier than downtown. O'Hare airport has a curfew until 6 am, but security, clerks, crews, and passenger need to get to the airport ahead of time, maybe even 5 am, to catch that initial burst of outbound flights. Another reason for driving to O'Hare is that there is little transit service for those hours.
Home to work trips certainly won't be accommodated by a round trip from Dubuque that only starts when people may need to be at O'Hare already.
Falcon48: Ha! Loved your description of Rockford!! A northern route going through Marengo and Belvidere and ending in Rockford has some potential, but really as an extended commuter service, as both those communities have quite a few commuters inbound. (Look at the E-bound flow on I -90 early in the morning.) But as a corridor ending on the Mississippi, about the only traffic would be Friday to Sunday to/from tourist spots in Galena and maybe Dubuque. "Downtown" Rockford is continuing to die, even after various attempts to revitalize. The rest of Rockford's future is doubtful as well.
schlimm I agree although I think the problem in planning stems from "looking at what was to guide what will be." And also from no unified approach, with separate/competing agencies: State of Illinois subsidized Amtrak vs Metra. Pretty clearly, the Chicago - Rockford route should be an extension of the Metra MIL West line to Elgin and Big Timber, with 4-5 train pairs having Rockford as the end point. The only "obstacle" would be changing to either the UP line through Belvidere or the CN line at Genoa. Again, this is the problem with separate agencies and rail companies: coordination is difficult on something that would be simple if it were all under one roof. DeKalb should have Metra service. Unfortunately, DeKalb County is outside the RTA 6 county tax district, so once again you run into a lack of integration. Perhaps a state/Amtrak route with several trains per day to Chicago could be arranged.
I agree although I think the problem in planning stems from "looking at what was to guide what will be." And also from no unified approach, with separate/competing agencies: State of Illinois subsidized Amtrak vs Metra.
Pretty clearly, the Chicago - Rockford route should be an extension of the Metra MIL West line to Elgin and Big Timber, with 4-5 train pairs having Rockford as the end point. The only "obstacle" would be changing to either the UP line through Belvidere or the CN line at Genoa. Again, this is the problem with separate agencies and rail companies: coordination is difficult on something that would be simple if it were all under one roof.
DeKalb should have Metra service. Unfortunately, DeKalb County is outside the RTA 6 county tax district, so once again you run into a lack of integration. Perhaps a state/Amtrak route with several trains per day to Chicago could be arranged.
A routing via Metra to Elgin, CP (ex MILW) to Genoa and then CN might be a bit of a problem. The CN (ex IC) line crosses over the CP line at Genoa on a major grade separation. I'm not sure if there ever was a connection in the days of yore, but there isn't one now, and it would be a pretty major piece of construction to build one, given the significant difference in elevation. It would probably have to be done at a different location where the lines are more nearly at the same level, perhaps on the east end of Genoa (the existing crossing is on the west end). This would require a mile or two of new trackage and associate interlockings to tie the two routes together, possibly using the long dormant alignment of the Woodstock & Sycamore Traction Company on the east side of town (abandoned in 1918) a leading contender for the most unsuccessful interurban railroad ever built.
In response to HarveyK400's note, if the choice of routes was based on "estimated costs", I have to wonder whether those who wrote the study properly took account of the costs that would be imposed by the statutory positive train control (PTC) mandate.
The PTC mandate will require installation of PTC on any route used for intercity or commuter passenger service. Both the northern and southern routes would require installation of PTC for the service. But, the northern route would require new PTC only from Elgin west (the Metra portion of the route from Chicago to Elgin will need PTC to support the commuter service whether or not the intercity service is instituted). The southern route, in contrast, would require installation of PTC over the entire route.
On the other hand, if the study authors even considered PTC, they may have assumed that PTC would have to be installed on the southern route anyway to support TIH traffic moving that way, and so did not include this as a cost of the passenger service (I don;t know if much, or any, TIH is handled on the UP portion of the northern route - probably very little as the route is used primarily for auto traffic, and possibly not enough to require PTC). If so, however, this is a dangerous assumption. It begs the question of which service is incremental. The TIH shipers, when faced with likely rate increases to pay for PTC, will likely argue that they shouldn't pay because the PTC would have to be installed anyway to support the intercity pasenger operation. The passenger operator (presumably Amtrak) would, of course, argue the opposite - that they shouldn't have to pay anything because the PTC would have to be installed anyway to support the TIH traffic. Now, it should be obvious that they can't BOTH be right, otherwise neither would have to pay anything for the costs imposed by their traffic. This is an important issue which will need to be resolved going forward. But it hasn't yet been resolved, and anyone who makes financila studies based on the assumption that it wil lbe resolved one way or the other is treading on dangerous ground.
But, of course, the cost of service is only one of the major factors the economic equation. The other is what the relative demand for the service is likely to be on the two routes. Given the figures reportedly used in the study - even if they are correct - the prospects for a menaingful number of passengers are dismal regardless of what route is chosen. The study estimated that the southern route would have the highest ridership at about 76,000 riders per year. Even if you accept this (it's pretty hard to see how the southern route could have higher ridership than the northern route), the estimate represents daily ridership of just over 200 passengers. That's ridiculously low for an intercity passenger route, particularly one running more than one round trip per day. Frankly, this entire service - whether on the northern or sourthern route - makes little sense to me. Perhaps those promoting it believe that the ruins of downtown Rockford (if you've been to Rockford, you know what I mean) will eventually become a popular tourist attraction akin to the Acropolis in Athens and attract great hordes of eager tourists.
So, if I understand, the proposal would be to send a train out and back from Waterloo, because the IC ran there almost 40 years ago? You are talking very low populations: Waterloo - 70K; Manchester - 5K; Independence - 6K; and Dyersville - 4K after you pass Dubuque. So serving a potential of 85,000 people? That is exactly what Amtrak or whoever should not be wasting its limited resources on.
Los Angeles Rams Guy I STILL say this train NEEDS to be extended to Waterloo. While you have some slow running in Illinois, once you get west of Farley the former IC mainline was a racetrack back in the day.
I STILL say this train NEEDS to be extended to Waterloo. While you have some slow running in Illinois, once you get west of Farley the former IC mainline was a racetrack back in the day.
Even if a 70 mph average could be attained between Dubuque and Waterloo, that would add another 1-hr 20-min to the schedule. This would change the market for the service from an afternoon in Chicago to an overnight stay. You'd have to think about an early afternoon arrival in Chicago to have a more reasonable departure from Waterloo, Dubuque, and Galena. A 6:15 pm departure from Chicago wouldn't get into Waterloo until around 1 am; so an afternoon departure after a short turn around for servicing may be necessary.
A Waterloo train arriving and departing Chicago in the afternoon would fill a gap in a service comprising the equivalent of two round trips each between Dubuque and Freeport and Chicago with two trains cycling back and forth. Dubuque and Freeport trains would pass on the two main tracks east of Elgin. The down side is that a passing siding would be needed for the Waterloo train meets.
I can recall the line as the IC with the Land of Corn and Hawkeye, which ran at a slow speed out of Chicago to Broadview (13 miles in 25 minutes = 31 mph) and then fast the rest of the way to Rockford 72.2 miles in 65 minutes = 66.6 mph, often running above 70-80 mph, in making the 85 mile trip in 90 minutes = 56.7 mph). The Amtrak Black Hawk (name borrowed from the CB&Q's night train CHI-MSP) was a lot slower (112 minutes = 45.5 mph), but it did have a stop in Elmhurst at least.
But as you say, the biggest problem is the route, which basically serves nobody except from downtown Chicago Union Station to Rockford, completely ignoring the many large suburbs that could be served on a different route. And the notion that a stop in Genoa would serve the NIU crowd in DeKalb is laughable.
By contrast, Van Galder runs a bus service, 9 buses/day to Union Station, in 105 to 150 minutes, and more to or stopping at O'Hare (17) in 70 or 80 minutes.
I was around when the Blackhawk was running. The biggest problem was getting out of Chicago. Much of the Iowa Line was designated as within yard limits and restricted to 20 mph, and no more than 40 mph to Broadview. I don't know how much has changed in 35 years.
Amtrak tried RDC's on the Blackhawk which was fairly novel in the Chicago area since the C&NW sold its cars in 1955. The RDC's were orphans; and that was never a good situation. A diesel often had to pull the cars, and the RDC engines needed to be run for car heating.
The CN application for acquiring the EJE showed an expected traffic level of 1 train a day (1 switch turn 3 days a week?) east of Munger (Streamwood, IL) in the far western suburbs. Without State money, NS reduced the speed limit for 27 miles of track in Michigan to 40 mph and could happen in Illinois too. Then add the costs of maintaining signal systems, highway crossings, and railroad bridges.
I was told the decision was based on the difference between the estimated costs. The costs for both alternatives are similar to the initial study that used the cost for implementation "as is" for the All-CN route in comparison with improvements for the UP-Metra route. Furthermore, the initial study used an unexplained cost for reducing the All-CN travel time compared to the unimproved time for the UP-Metra route, along with suspicious estimates of NIU ridership at Genoa, to distort ridership estimates. After strenuously objecting to this fiasco three years ago, I didn't think they'd go ahead with basically the same flawed findings.
I heard then it was politics; but it is incredulous that this would still be the case after at least two State election cycles.
This simply shows how irrational and political the so-called "planning" process for passenger rail is. It is simply unfathomable how this "study" could conclude that the "northern" route (via an established Metra route through Chicago suburban territory to Elgin, and then via Huntley and Belvidere) would carry less passengers than the "southern" route via Genoa (population 4,169), which has virtually no intermediate passenger potential. This smells like a study designed to justify a political decision which had already been made (in other words, it stinks).
As an NIU graduate long ago (I used to ride the CNW Kate Shelley 400 Between DeKalb and Chicago), I certainly agree that Genoa will not be used by NIU students. It's too far away from NIU's campus at DeKalb to be a viable transportation option. Students going to Rockford or Dubuque would have to use a car to get to Genoa and there's no particular reason why they wouldn't simply drive all the way to their destination rather than take a train from Genoa (Rockford, for example, is less than an hour from DeKalb by highway). Students going to the Chicago area, if they do not drive all the way, would obviously go to the Metra station at Elburn, since the Metra service from Elburn is much more frequent and convenient than anything which would run through Genoa. If this study projected any ridership from NIU, the people who wrote it need to be tested for controlled substances.
Note, by the way, that the projected annual ridership figure of 76,357 for the "southern" route, even if valid, works out to only 209 riders per day (the equivalent of about 4 bus loads), which clearly does not justify the expenditure of $60 million in public funds for startup, plus the annual deficits. The money should instead be spent on CTA's deteriorating rapid transit infrastructure, which serves hundreds of thousands of people a day and is vital to the state's economy. But, of course, this wouldn't give Illinois politicians the opportunity to appear at a ribbon cutting ceremony. Is it any wonder that Illinois is nearly bankrupt?
Putting aside questions of subsidies and energy savings with rails, I think some factors in route planning need to be clear in order to provide a useful, needed service:
1. Corridors need to link metro areas with considerable population nodes in between.
2. Corridors should be short in elapsed time between endpoints. Examples: If average speed in a 300 mile long corridor is only 60 mph (5 hours), few people will choose the train because they can use their car or take a bus in a similar amount of time. If 100 mph, the train will be much quicker than by highway. If 150 mph, then the train is competitive with air.
3. Corridors should be considered only in areas where the alternatives (highway and/or air) are at or approaching capacity and adding lanes to the Interstate is impractical. Otherwise the cost of a new service is not justified.
4. Trains in a corridor need to run at average speeds of no less than 100 mph, in order to be competitive, as in #2, but also to allow greater equipment utilization in a 24 hour cycle and to have a frequent service, not just 1-2 trains per day.
I posted this announcement last week. Frankly, I think the proposal is rather foolish. There is too much of the "there used to be passenger service on this route (pre-and early Amtrak) so let's bring it back."
The Blackhawk never drew well before and thus it was dropped. Part of the problem, IMO, is a lack of vision in route/corridor selection. Why run a train to Dubuque? Why not run it to Galena on weekends only and only to Rockford the rest of the time? If you are going to have service, there need to be far more trains in each direction than two and they need to serve more population centers, such as the suburbs and DeKalb.
12/13/2010 Intercity Service
Last week, the Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) announced it selected a southern route for Amtrak’s new Chicago-Rockford-Dubuque service. IDOT made the decision based on an independent study conducted by URS Corp., which showed a southern route through Genoa, Ill., would require $26.2 million to upgrade infrastructure between Chicago and Rockford. The department estimates it will cost a total of $60 million to implement the service, which could start by early 2014. Making similar improvements on a proposed northern route through Belvidere would cost $62.3 million, raising the total cost of the route to $96 million, according to IDOT. In addition, the study projects annual ridership on the southern route at 76,357 vs. 54,988 on the northern route. Plus, the southern route will cross 143 roads while the northern route would have crossed 176, IDOT said. On-time performance is expected to be higher on the southern route, as well; the corridor is used by two railroads while the northern route is used by four.
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Who am I to question this; but I do.
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