Illinois
Chicago-St. Louis 220-mph
The Midwest High Speed Rail Association has proposed linking Chicago and St. Louis in less than two hours via 220-mph bullet trains. Click here to learn more.
PROJECTS FUNDED IN 2010
Chicago-St. Louis 110-mph
Illinois was awarded a $1.1 billion ARRA grant to replace 183 miles of track. Service speed for three of Amtrak’s five Chicago-St. Louis trains will be able to go 110-mph in this section when the work is completed. Click here to learn more.
Englewood Flyover
The Englewood Flyover project is a part of Chicago’s CREATE program. The project was awarded $133,000,000 in federal funding through ARRA. The goal of the project is to eliminate a major bottleneck in Southern Chicago between Metra’s Rock Island District line and a Norfolk Southern’s freight, which is also used by Amtrak trains to Michigan and the East Coast. The Rock Island line will be put to an overpass, lowering delays and raising capacity. More on Englewood Flyover and CREATE.
Normal Intermodal Center
The Town of Normal has received a federal TIGER grant of $22 million for the Uptown Normal Transportation Center. Click here to learn more.
Chicago-Moline-Iowa City
The FRA awarded Iowa and Illinois $230 million to launch passenger rail service between Iowa City, Moline and Chicago, nicknamed "The Green Line." In addition, Illinois Governor Quinn is investing $45 million from the Illinois Jobs Now! capital program for the line’s reconstruction and Iowa had planned to contribute $20.6 million. Service between Chicago and Moline is expected to begin in 2013 with full service to Iowa City to follow in 2015.
The new service will run along the existing BNSF tracks used by trains to Quincy for much of its route, but will diverge southwest of Princeton, stopping at Geneseo, Moline, and Iowa City.
The plan for the Illinois segment is two daily round trips from Chicago to Moline, taking just over three hours. This is an important development for the Quad Cities, which have not had passenger rail service since the late 1970s. The project is also expected to create more than 2,100 jobs in Illinois.
As part of the Quad Cities project, Illinois is also funding a new $16.6 million multi-modal Amtrak station in Moline, in the O’Rourke Building at 1201 4th Avenue, which will be part of the John Deere Commons. A Federal TIGER grant of $10 million for the Moline station was one of only 75 projects funded through the US DOT, which received nearly one thousand applications nationwide. The remainder of the project is funded by $4.9 million from the Illinois Jobs Now! capital program and $1.7 million from the City of Moline.
The project’s design and engineering phases will take place winter 2010-2011. Construction will start in spring 2011, with the facility opening in late 2012.
As part of the Green Line, the new LEED-Certified Moline station will be the key component of the city’s Green Enterprise Zone, which aims to transform Moline’s riverfront into a focal point for green technology, innovation, energy efficiency, and river restoration.
PROJECTS IN THE WORKS
Chicago Union Station
Chicago’s Union Station is a critical part of the Midwest rail system. Upgrades should be pursued in order to improve capacity and service quality for trains throughout the Midwest. Click here to learn more.
O’Hare train stations
O’Hare International Airport is the Midwest’s gateway to international markets and the coasts. O’Hare needs to be connected not only to downtown Chicago and other suburbs with Airport shuttle trains. Click here to learn more.
Chicago-St. Louis double-tracking
Additionally, $1,250,000 in ARRA funds have been allocated for the environmental review restoring a second track to the entire route. Currently, most of the route is a single-track mainline.
On February 14, 2011, the Federal Railroad Administration issued a public notice on an Environmental Impact Statement for the Chicago–St. Louis high-speed rail program corridor. The study will analyze a range of route alternatives between Chicago and Joliet, and will examine additional improvements between Joliet and St. Louis to support additional passenger trains.
Chicago-Rockford-Dubuque
In 2007, Amtrak studied development of a new intercity corridor from Chicago to Dubuque via Rockford. The estimated cost of the project ranges from $33 million to $55 million depending on routing. Initially, service would be with one daily train, though modest freight traffic along most of the route would allow service to be readily expanded. The initial service would include a single round-trip in each direction, with a roughly 5-hour trip time.
Illinois Valley Commuter Rail corridor
Several towns and cities along I-80 west of Joliet have joined together in support of new commuter rail service to Chicago, using Metra’s Rock Island District line to Joliet and tracks owned by CSX and the Iowa Interstate Railroad to bring new commuter rail to Chicago’s far southwestern suburbs. This corridor offers the potential for new rail service to La Salle, Minooka, Utica, as well as the potential for new intercity rail service to Iowa City in the corridor. The corridor also allows intercity service to Peoria.
STAR Line
Metra’s planned Suburban Transit Access Route (STAR) is a key part of the Midwest regional system. Besides its clear transit benefits, the route will connect the Western suburbs to O’Hare airport and Joliet, both of which can become suburban hubs for intercity trains radiating outwards from Chicago. The portion of the STAR line along the I-90 corridor to O’Hare can be used by intercity trains as well as Metra’s trains, and connects the Western suburbs such as Naperville and Elgin to O’Hare. The north-south section of the STAR line can also connect these suburbs to St. Louis-bound trains at Joliet.
