The Chicago plan: relief at last? Government and industry proponents hope that the prospect of better service nationwide will help to win a large federal contribution to a $1.5 billion unsnarling of the Chicago Terminal District, the biggest U.S. railroad bottleneck - Chicago, Illinois

Railway Age, July, 2003 by Frank Malone

Central: The most important to the city, a 23-mile route that would remove freight trains from seven miles along Lake Michigan and 1.1 miles through a reborn area just south of downtown. "This has been a long-term goal of ours," says a spokesman for the Chicago Department of Transportation. "It will eliminate freight traffic in a growing residential area and along the environmentally sensitive lakefront, and provide additional acreage for parkland and other land uses." Near-downtown trackage includes the 0.7 mile St. Charles Airline, owned 50% by CN, 25% by BNSF. and 25% by UP, connecting CN and other carriers. UP will donate its interest to the city, while negotiations continue with BNSF and CN, which also owns the 0.4-mile west approach to the Airline.

CN's alternate route would use NS right-of-way from the grade separated Grand Crossing (76th Street) on the south, along with that of other carriers to Ogden Jct. on the north and from there BOCT and former Wisconsin Central (now CN) track west and northwest to Franklin Park. This would require a flyover of Metra Electric tracks so CN can connect with NS and a new third main along the south side of NS tracks to Englewood. There, a flyover would take the Metra Rock Island line over the enlarged freight corridor. This follows a plan developed by the Illinois Department of Transportation in 1998.

Passenger: A 15-mile route from LaSalle Street Station on the south edge of downtown to Chicago Ridge southwest of the city, including a new link between Metra's SouthWest Service and Rock Island commuter lines allowing SWS trains to use LaSalle Street instead of at-capacity Chicago Union Station. It also would include Metra flyovers at Forest Hill and Belt Jct. in the heavy-traffic 76th Street route that Metra shares with NS and BRC. An eight-mile parallel segment of the Passenger Corridor from Union Station to Englewood would include a Canal Street flyover at a critical interlocking for some Amtrak trains.

East-West: A 15-mile BRC/NS route linking the BRC South Chicago yard on the east with the Clearing Yard on the West.

With these corridors, notes the NS spokesman, "we will attain greater operating flexibility, improved transit times, faster train speeds, and much less interference with commuter operations."

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