Two notable updates on Hiawatha Service.
(1) Business class is now offered on the 8:05am southbound and the 8:05pm northbound. That appears to be by virtue of the Borealis trainset spending the night in Milwaukee, the westbound Borealis trainset running MKE-CHI-MKE-MSP in the AM, the eastbound Borealis trainset doing MSP-MKE-CHI-MKE in the PM. I wonder if the cafe is staffed on the Hiawatha leg? It is staffed on the Borealis segment between CHI-MKE / MKE-CHI. Nice to have two of seven daily round trips with business class and (perhaps both) with cafe. I'd think there's a decent chance that expansion to MSN and/or GRB would mean a cafe car so perhaps
eventually all MKE-CHI will have onboard service and business class.
(2) Wisconsin received $72.8m in federal funding toward the Muskego Yards project in Milwaukee, new track permitting freights to bypass the Milwaukee Internmodal Station and ancillary improvements including five bridge replacements. This project is one of the prerequisites for Hiawatha expansion, both additional MKE-CHI trains and extnesion of CHI-MKE to Madison and/or Green Bay.
https://urbanmilwaukee.com/pressrel...nearly-73-million-for-milwaukee-rail-project/
Some 5-6 years back attemps to add more Hiawtha trips were squashed by some north shore Chicago burbs blocking a proposed siding which would destory their quality of life and make their properties worthless (paraphrasing
) However in documents / stories floating around when CP + KCS merger was being discussed it appeared they were open to added frequencies
without that specific siding. If I recall correctly the key requirements were the Muskego Yards project, the dual-track platform expansion of Milwaukee Airport Rail Station, and improvements in Lake Forest areas described as "universal crossover" or "double crossover". Anybody have any information more contemporary / comprehensive than "the burbs said no to the siding, so no additional trains" which was 5 1/2 years ago?
In the March 15 2023 EB Surface Transportation Board Decision doc (the link below should download it) it sounds like Amtrak's part of the green light for CPKS merger included more Hiawathas The passage below is from page 139
https://dcms-external.s3.amazonaws.com/DCMS_External_PROD/1678885209922/51549.pdf
CPKC will permit Amtrak to add additional or new passenger rail service on certainCPKC-owned lines, specifically (1) the CP-owned portion of the Hiawatha route betweenChicago and Milwaukee, (2) the CP-owned lines between Chicago and Minneapolis-St.Paul, (3) the KCS-owned lines between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, and (4) the CPowned Detroit River Tunnel between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, (id., Ex. CP-AmtrakAgreement, paras. 1-4);
So
maybe with Musego Yards and the expansion of the MARS platform the Hiawatha can add an 8th, 9th and 10th trip? It all takes time and funding of course, but expansion to 10 trips has been in the works for more than a decade.
