Ambitious restoration and transformation in the Chicago area

[Mystic River Dragon]

Is the taxicab stand still at the same place? Can you still get to it by walking out the door from the upstairs part of the lounge?

Also, do Lyft and Uber pick up there as well? Or elsewhere at the station?

Sorry if this was posted above and I missed it. Going to Chicago soon, and this would be helpful to know. Thenks.

 

[MisterUptempo]

Is the taxicab stand still at the same place? Can you still get to it by walking out the door from the upstairs part of the lounge?

Also, do Lyft and Uber pick up there as well? Or elsewhere at the station?

Sorry if this was posted above and I missed it. Going to Chicago soon, and this would be helpful to know. Thenks.

The last time I was there, yes, the cab stand was still on the west side of Canal near the south stairs and the Metropolitan Lounge's upper doors.

Uber and Lyft do service Union Station. Pick up/drop off has been on the west side of Canal at Adams.

I haven't been at Union in a while, but might take a run on the Southwest Service soon to see what I can see.

When I have to head downtown for work, I've been using the Rock Island. It's about as close to me as the Southwest Service. While the Southwest only runs 6 or 7 round trips right now, The Rock runs multiple times that many, and with the South Cook Fair Transit Program, tickets on The Rock are much cheaper.

ETA - For anyone planning a trip through Union in the future, I know CDOT has mentioned recently that they plan on reconstructing the Canal Street Viaduct soon. It's one of the reasons Amtrak pushed to get the new Clinton Street doors, which open into the not-yet-complete food hall and into the Great Hall, ready for use. If you head to Google Maps, you can see the three new doors and canopy on the Clinton side.

Right now, CDOT is working on the intersection of Harrison and Canal, as well as Harrison from the C&A Sugar House to the intersection at Canal.

A side note - It's really great to see the Clinton Street side of Union fully opened up. All the windows have been reinstalled and that side no longer resembles a fortified military installation.

When the time comes for CDOT to rip up Canal, most of the traffic that uses Canal will temporarily use Clinton instead. That would, I'd imagine, means taxis and rideshare as well. But I don't think it's happening in the very near future. CDOT will post plenty of warnings when it does.

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

The mobility plan has a number of interesting rail projects that perhaps everyone here is already familiar with, including connecting the Michigan Line with CSX so the Pere Marquette can service New Buffalo, and also connecting the Michigan Line to the South Shore at Michigan City, to allow the Pere Marquette to take the South Shore into Chicago, no doubt utilizing the 16th Street Connector (or St. Charles Airline Connector, whatever) when and if it gets built.

It seems surprising that they would use the NICTD tracks to Chicago (obviously once in Chicago they would use CN).

That's for digging all this information up, very interesting.

 

[MisterUptempo]

It seems surprising that they would use the NICTD tracks to Chicago (obviously once in Chicago they would use CN).

That's for digging all this information up, very interesting.

It does mention the South Shore in the line item in the mobility plan as well as the MIPRC presentation. I'm wondering whether "south shore" is just shorthand for any tracks that head up to Chicago on what was the IC, including the CN tracks. I dunno.

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

It does mention the South Shore in the line item in the mobility plan as well as the MIPRC presentation. I'm wondering whether "south shore" is just shorthand for any tracks that head up to Chicago on what was the IC, including the CN tracks. I dunno.

Same person who transposed Amtrak and Metra in the other article? Amtrak could certainly run on the NICTD but with their increased traffic coming with the Munster extension I wonder if they would want Amtrak clogging things? Metra certainly wouldn't want them on the main line (plus the CN tracks already run the right way - funnily enough I got to see the inbound CONO from LSD and one of the Illinois service trains from the Stevenson the other day - kind of fun trainspotting!).

 

[MisterUptempo]

Same person who transposed Amtrak and Metra in the other article? Amtrak could certainly run on the NICTD but with their increased traffic coming with the Munster extension I wonder if they would want Amtrak clogging things? Metra certainly wouldn't want them on the main line (plus the CN tracks already run the right way - funnily enough I got to see the inbound CONO from LSD and one of the Illinois service trains from the Stevenson the other day - kind of fun trainspotting!).

Using the NICTD figures into Amtrak's plans to run 8 round trips CHI-IND, with 4 headed to Cincy and 4 to Louisville. In the Amtrak Connects plan, NICTD is listed as one of the host railroads. I took that to mean using the CN tracks, connecting to the NICTD/South Shore at Kensington, to the West Lake Extension tracks at Hammond, where they'd eventually transfer to the Monon sub at Dyer., where West Lake terminates.

West Lake is anticipated to be complete in 2025, which likely means if Amtrak starts the service to Indy before the 16th Street Connector is complete, they'd just have to perform the backup onto the Air Line.

 

[jis]

Interconnected series of projects would include new entry to city, improvements at Union Station and in Michigan

https://www.trains.com/trn/news-rev...ructure-plan-to-transform-chicago-operations/
Includes rerouting of Cardinal between Chicago and Dyer! If it happen it will indeed transform entrance into Chicago from the east and south.

 

[moselman66]

https://www.trains.com/trn/news-rev...ructure-plan-to-transform-chicago-operations/
Includes rerouting of Cardinal between Chicago and Dyer! If it happen it will indeed transform entrance into Chicago from the east and south.

Anybody with better insight have an idea of how much time this could shave off CHI-IND?

That it's five hours between Chicago and Indy just kills what could be a potentially big rail market. Even if there's a way to overcome all the routine issues every potential expansion faces to one degree or another (hostile government, funding, uncooperative freight lines, etc.) the current route for CHI-IND is prohibitively slow to ever make much headway. Speed improvement usually come in smaller increments -- five minutes here, fifteen minutes there, but every bit helps.

Making Michigan service more reliable and maybe shaving a little time is great, and those have realistic benefits toward improving service (reliability, frequency, increased usage) we can hope to see. But CHI-IND seems like such a hopeless topic without huge money and a reversal of political will that a little optimism here would be welcome.

 

[NES28]

CHI-IND seems like such a hopeless topic without huge money and a reversal of political will that a little optimism here would be welcome.

With the money now available from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) this would be the right time for Indiana to respond to the FRA Request for Expressions of Interest for Corridor Identification. Interestingly, the FRA Midwest Regional Plan found that Chicago-Indianapolis high-speed rail would be profitable to operate.

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

It's kind of surprising to me how indirect the route into Indy is from the NW - whereas I-65 is fairly direct. I know there are a lot of old ROW's in the area, but not sure they were going in that direction (there was one in the Tippecanoe River SP for example).

 

[jis]

Anybody with better insight have an idea of how much time this could shave off CHI-IND?

Some educated guesses from people that know way more about the lay of the land around there than I says 10-15mins conservatively.

 

[Burns651]

Same person who transposed Amtrak and Metra in the other article? Amtrak could certainly run on the NICTD but with their increased traffic coming with the Munster extension I wonder if they would want Amtrak clogging things? Metra certainly wouldn't want them on the main line (plus the CN tracks already run the right way - funnily enough I got to see the inbound CONO from LSD and one of the Illinois service trains from the Stevenson the other day - kind of fun trainspotting!).

I have a copy of the "Michigan Line Corridor Plan- Operational Schematic" showing current and long-term configurations, prepared by Amtrak Corporate Planning and dated 5/18/20. It shows not only Michigan trains but also eastern long-distance ones using the NICTD to 16th St.- Chicago and into a "New St. Charles Airline Head-on Connection." Double-track extension and other improvements would allow for extensive sections of higher-speed running up to 110 MPH as far west as Hegewisch. It notes that "80 mph universal XO's on each end of all NICTD platforms would be best for Amtrak."

Long-distance trains would run on approximately .7 mile of relaid NKP track from where it currently ends at N. Dickson St. in Michigan City to the MC. They'd then cross the drawbridge and veer off immediately west of it along with the Michigan trains to the NICTD power plant spur, which ties into the NICTD mainline on the west side of town. "Future Amtrak-NICTD connection from South Shore tail track to Amtrak MI Line along ex Monon [that's an error, it's NKP] RoW. Allows Amtrak LD trains to operate via NICTD from South Bend. While not using the Michigan City Street Running tracks." I don't know if the recent removal of that street running would change those plans to allow LD trains to use the NICTD mainline all the way. The "tail track" route would still involve less grade crossings.

The plan notes the oft-discussed new connection at New Buffalo to reroute the PM onto the MI Line, and illustrates the new section of double track in Michigan. It would begin at the new station of "Glenwood" at approximately MP 174 and end at CP 192/Niles. The existing Dowagiac and Niles controlled sidings would be upgraded into this new double track.

 

[Steve4031]

Iirc there are high level platforms at South Chicago and Gary with gauntlet tracks for freights to work around the platform. I’m assuming these would work for getting Superliners through there. There is another area at the state line, iirc, where there’s shark curves and diamond crossings of a freight rt.

 

[MisterUptempo]

It's kind of surprising to me how indirect the route into Indy is from the NW - whereas I-65 is fairly direct. I know there are a lot of old ROW's in the area, but not sure they were going in that direction (there was one in the Tippecanoe River SP for example).

There have been a number of routings suggested between CHI-IND.

One, promoted by some pushing for a CHI-FTW-COL route, envisions heading out of Chicago, picking up the CFE running east-southeast to Wanatah, turning south onto 25 miles of reconstructed Monon line to a rehabbed Medaryville Industrial Line (former Monon), continuing onto CSX's Monon Sub and completing the trip to Indy in the same fashion as The Hoosier State.

You'd lose Dyer and Rensselaer, but potentially pick up Gary and Valparaiso.

To play a little Amtrak Fantasy League, it would be nice to continue rebuilding the Monon Line north from Wanatah all the way back into Michigan City, giving passengers riding on the Michigan Line a route to Indy without having to go all the way into Chicago, as the Michigan Line parallels the former Monon in Michigan City (Is it possible that portion of the Michigan Line was Monon at one time?).

Another routing, coming from the High Speed Rail Alliance, has trains heading out of Chicago on CN's former IC Line to Kankakee, turning onto the KBS to Lafayette, where it turns onto the Monon sub, and, as with the CFE routing, heads to Indy on the same route as the Hoosier State. HSRA see it as a high speed line, which would mean extensive rebuilding of the entire route.

Here again you lose Dyer and Rensselaer, but pick up Homewood and Kankakee.

Station location is a problem; Kankakee's station is several thousand feet too far south and Lafayette's station is about 1000 feet too far north.

 

[Cal]

https://www.trains.com/trn/news-rev...ructure-plan-to-transform-chicago-operations/
Includes rerouting of Cardinal between Chicago and Dyer! If it happen it will indeed transform entrance into Chicago from the east and south.

I am unfamiliar with the Chicago area. Is there a map anywhere that provides a visual to these plans?

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

There have been a number of routings suggested between CHI-IND.

One, promoted by some pushing for a CHI-FTW-COL route, envisions heading out of Chicago, picking up the CFE running east-southeast to Wanatah, turning south onto 25 miles of reconstructed Monon line to a rehabbed Medaryville Industrial Line (former Monon), continuing onto CSX's Monon Sub and completing the trip to Indy in the same fashion as The Hoosier State.

You'd lose Dyer and Rensselaer, but potentially pick up Gary and Valparaiso.

To play a little Amtrak Fantasy League, it would be nice to continue rebuilding the Monon Line north from Wanatah all the way back into Michigan City, giving passengers riding on the Michigan Line a route to Indy without having to go all the way into Chicago, as the Michigan Line parallels the former Monon in Michigan City (Is it possible that portion of the Michigan Line was Monon at one time?).

Another routing, coming from the High Speed Rail Alliance, has trains heading out of Chicago on CN's former IC Line to Kankakee, turning onto the KBS to Lafayette, where it turns onto the Monon sub, and, as with the CFE routing, heads to Indy on the same route as the Hoosier State. HSRA see it as a high speed line, which would mean extensive rebuilding of the entire route.

Here again you lose Dyer and Rensselaer, but pick up Homewood and Kankakee.

Station location is a problem; Kankakee's station is several thousand feet too far south and Lafayette's station is about 1000 feet too far north.

Yeah. there would be lots of options. I'm talking more what is available now - it's not readily obvious to me if there was actually a direct, "air line" route to Indy from Chicago. Historically NW Indiana was very interesting with the various lines splaying out to the east, southeast and south all converging closer and closer together to get to Chicago. Driving through Porter County, for example, you cross so many old ROW's close together.

Gary and Valpo would certainly be bigger population centers than Dyer - seems that you'd want to add a station in like Hammond to get those passengers (does Dyer have that many as it is? None of them will make their way to Gary to catch the train). Plus you'd be able to give Valpo commuter service again - I think it's one of the bigger & more prominent cities around Chicago that doesn't have rail service at the moment.

 

[Burns651]

...would be nice to continue rebuilding the Monon Line north from Wanatah all the way back into Michigan City, giving passengers riding on the Michigan Line a route to Indy without having to go all the way into Chicago, as the Michigan Line parallels the former Monon in Michigan City (Is it possible that portion of the Michigan Line was Monon at one time?).

That's a very cool idea! The Monon RoW parallels the east/south side of the Michigan Line in Michigan City. The Michigan Line is strictly ex-MC from Porter to West Detroit, except for the CN segment in Battle Creek.

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

That's a very cool idea! The Monon RoW parallels the east/south side of the Michigan Line in Michigan City. The Michigan Line is strictly ex-MC from Porter to West Detroit, except for the CN segment in Battle Creek.

That seems like a lot of additional mileage to get to Chicago from the south, especially since you'd be backtracking back to the south around the bottom of the lake to get there (hopefully my snip from OpenRailwayMap works). It also illustrates my earlier comment about the converging lines to Chicago.

 

[jis]

I am unfamiliar with the Chicago area. Is there a map anywhere that provides a visual to these plans?

Map specific to the NICTD proposed West Lake Corridor and how it affects the Cardinal by connecting into its route at Dyre is illustrated in this map:

http://www.nictdwestlake.com/map/
The general project page is West Lake Corridor Project

The Amtrak Dyre station is on the same line a little past the terminus station of the West Lake Corridor at Munster Dyer Main St.

Today the Cardinal joins this line at the point that CN line crosses this line between the proposed Munster Ridge Rd. and the Munster Dyer Main St. station.

After the full buildout of the direct access to the St. Charles Airline from Chicago Union Station, the Cardinal would get onto the St. Charles via the new direct link and thence onto NICTD. It will travel on NICTD to the proposed new station at Hammond Gateway where it will branch off to the NICTD West Lake Corridor and follow it to Dyer and then on the current route from Dyer to Indy.

You can also see all this on the FTA Map (PDF).

For a more comprehensive Chicago area projects under the CREATE umbrella you can see these two PDF documents:

CREATE Projects with Passenger Benefits opens in a new tab (PDF)

CREATE High Speed Rail and Intercity Benefits opens in a new tab (PDF)

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

Here's what I'd like to know - eventually - is whether Amtrak would actually share track or run on adjacent track in the ROW (which is what happens now on the CN/MED ROW - which obviously was originally the IC mainline [and if I understand it correctly, was a branch which eventually became the IC mainline once Chicago's rail primacy became obvious/evident - it was going to run straight up the middle of the state to Rockford, more or less]). Certainly north of Kensington it's a no brainer to run on CN - Amtrak already runs at 70+ MPH along Lake Shore Drive and the connection to the St Charles Airline is already in place.

Keep in mind that from Van Buren to 115/Kensington NICTD runs on MED tracks (NICTD has their own terminal at Randolph) - after that to the east it's NICTD trackage. The CN are double (not sure from where to where but it looks like from just north of McCormack Place to somewhere south of U Park) and with some new bridges the Airline could be doubled. Metra is electroquad tracked to 115th (really 111th being the end of the express-limited-local service pattern soutbound).

 

[jis]

I think the general idea is to get Amtrak off of freight railroad dispatched trackage and onto passenger railroad dispatched trackage (METRA, NICTD, Amtrak etc.) wherever possible.

We have been exploring similar opportunities wherever possible in Florida too. New York has done so with the New York - Albany segment of the Empire Service.

The idea is to see how much of such can be achieved in the Chicago area, and specifically South of the Lake to avoid the fiasco otherwise known as NS, with its high tech auto-dispatcher which cannot find its way out of a wet brown paper bag (incidentally apparently CN is in the process of acquiring the same Wabtec system). This includes the possibility of running Amtrak entirely on NICTD all the way out to South Bend, and avoid freight railroads completely to gain access from Chicago to Amtrak trackage in Michigan.

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

Looks like there is already a connection between CN and NICTD (this is an aerial shot just south of 115th) which I couldn't remember - there's a crossover just to the north between the two CN tracks. The four left hand tracks are the electric MED tracks:

 

[Metra Electric Rider]

I think the general idea is to get Amtrak off of freight railroad dispatched trackage and onto passenger railroad dispatched trackage (METRA, NICTD, Amtrak etc.) wherever possible.

We have been exploring similar opportunities wherever possible in Florida too. New York has done so with the New York Alabny segment of the Empire Service.

The idea is to see how much of such can be achieved in the Chicago area, and specifically South of the Lake to avoid the fiasco otherwise known as NS, with its high tech auto-dispatcher which cannot find its way out of a wet brown paper bag (incidentally apparently CN is in the process of acquiring the same Wabtec system). This includes the possibility of running Amtrak entirely on NICTD all the way out to South Bend, and avoid freight railroads completely to gain access from Chicago to Amtrak trackage in Michigan.

Yes, that makes sense. I just can't see adding Amtrak onto MED - with both South Shore and the frequent Metra stops it seems like a recipe for congestion. MED already is by far and above the rest of Metra for on-time performance. The CONO comes through at wildly varying times (obviously we're talking other service which potentially would be on time). I know it's done on MetroNorth and elsewhere on the NEC, but it seems if CN could be bought or Amtrak taking over dispatching there it would solve the issue.

IIRC CN has talked about dumping the northern section of the line once CREATE happened thought with that slow-tracked who knows - they've put a lot of money into the tracks lately.

Of course.... I just had a brilliant idea. Amtrak could build two exclusive tracks along the ROW - it's certainly wide enough north of Kensington - in fact it looks like there are 8 tracks for several miles north of there - six start just south of 79th street, but the ROW supported more for years. I think it sported 10-12 tracks north of Kenwood to Central Station when that existed.

 

[MisterUptempo]

Yes, that makes sense. I just can't see adding Amtrak onto MED - with both South Shore and the frequent Metra stops it seems like a recipe for congestion. MED already is by far and above the rest of Metra for on-time performance. The CONO comes through at wildly varying times (obviously we're talking other service which potentially would be on time). I know it's done on MetroNorth and elsewhere on the NEC, but it seems if CN could be bought or Amtrak taking over dispatching there it would solve the issue.

IIRC CN has talked about dumping the northern section of the line once CREATE happened thought with that slow-tracked who knows - they've put a lot of money into the tracks lately.

Of course.... I just had a brilliant idea. Amtrak could build two exclusive tracks along the ROW - it's certainly wide enough north of Kensington - in fact it looks like there are 8 tracks for several miles north of there - six start just south of 79th street, but the ROW supported more for years. I think it sported 10-12 tracks north of Kenwood to Central Station when that existed.

The Trains article jis linked to further up the thread mentions that purchasing the CN freight tracks from downtown Chicago to Kensington is very much part of the plan, but it is the only portion of the plan that is not constrained at this time.

I took another look at MDOT's Tier 1 South of the Lake plans, and Route 9 (options 1 and 2), which utilized the same CN tracks, would have flown over NICTD at Kensington to connect to the IHB and then onto CSX Porter Sub (option 2 connected to CSX at Ivanhoe, option 1 connected to CSX 5 miles further east at a greenfield connection), eventually turning onto the Michigan Line at Porter.

I'm glad that Amtrak is trying to get off freight corridors, but their plans lean pretty heavily on NICTD at the moment. I just hope, at some point, they consider building a little redundancy into the system, in case, for example, there is an accident on the 16th Street Connector or a major derailment on NICTD, either of which could gum up the works pretty badly. Keeping these South of the Lake plans in their back pocket might not be a bad idea.

 

[jis]

It would be interesting to see what the Amtrak plans alluded to by @Burns651 in his post above has to say about all this. Clearly they do have to address the issues raised by @Metra Electric Rider. I am referring to this post.