Good news for Chicago-area rail passengers. Quo0ting the Tribune: Federal, state and local officials Thursday marked the opening of the $142 million Englewood Flyover, a railroad bridge intended to eliminate a major bottleneck in the nation's biggest, busiest and most congested railroad hub.
The bridge will relieve Metra and Amtrak train delays and reduce emissions and noise from idling trains in the Englewood neighborhood, officials said. ... The bridge replaces a rail crossing between the north-south Metra Rock Island tracks and a set of east-west Norfolk Southern tracks at 63rd and State streets, often blamed for causing havoc in Metra and Amtrak schedules.
The U.S. Department of Transportation considered the crossing one of the worst railway obstructions in North America. Rail experts have long pointed out that it can take as long as two days for a freight train, slowed by a bewildering, century-old maze of tracks and outdated signals and switches, to pass through the city.
The new bridge, completed earlier this month, carries 78 weekday Rock Island Line trains over the tracks used by approximately 60 freight and 14 Amtrak trains a day.
The flyover is a major component of the program known as the Chicago Region Environmental and Transportation Efficiency, or CREATE, to ease rail congestion. lRelated
News
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CREATE is a first-of-its-kind partnership between the U.S. Department of Transportation, the state of Illinois, the city of Chicago, Metra, Amtrak and the nation's freight railroads.
The flyover was funded with a combination of federal, state and railroad industry money.
The flyover's completion lays the groundwork for two more CREATE projects. The planned 75th Street Corridor Improvement Project will divert trains on Metra's Southwest Service to the Rock Island District at a point south of Englewood, officials said. Also, the planned Grand Crossing Project will shift six daily Amtrak trains to Norfolk Southern tracks east of Englewood.
The Dean campaign awakened so much latent hope… Dum spire, spree--"While I breathe, I hope." They say a year is forever in politics, so perhaps we will live to see the like again. Last night I was reading an opinion piece with the thesis that Irish independence was really the result of a generational change in Irish politics, and suggesting that the political situation in Scotland is analogous. Might the old, tired, hidebound politics of our country be renewed by a generational change? One would hope so, and sooner rather than later. I don't see it yet, but thet's the way it would likely happen, right? A widespread, subtle change, creeping up on all of us across the country, occult until suddenly it snowballs, seemingly out of nowhere, but based upon our society's general feeling of what is right.
I still find much reflection on the Dean Campaign days.
ReplyDeleteAs do I. I especially miss the MeetUps.
DeleteIncidentally, SeaMonkey is now my default browser.
Good news for Chicago-area rail passengers. Quo0ting the Tribune:
ReplyDeleteFederal, state and local officials Thursday marked the opening of the $142 million Englewood Flyover, a railroad bridge intended to eliminate a major bottleneck in the nation's biggest, busiest and most congested railroad hub.
The bridge will relieve Metra and Amtrak train delays and reduce emissions and noise from idling trains in the Englewood neighborhood, officials said.
...
The bridge replaces a rail crossing between the north-south Metra Rock Island tracks and a set of east-west Norfolk Southern tracks at 63rd and State streets, often blamed for causing havoc in Metra and Amtrak schedules.
The U.S. Department of Transportation considered the crossing one of the worst railway obstructions in North America.
Rail experts have long pointed out that it can take as long as two days for a freight train, slowed by a bewildering, century-old maze of tracks and outdated signals and switches, to pass through the city.
The new bridge, completed earlier this month, carries 78 weekday Rock Island Line trains over the tracks used by approximately 60 freight and 14 Amtrak trains a day.
The flyover is a major component of the program known as the Chicago Region Environmental and Transportation Efficiency, or CREATE, to ease rail congestion.
lRelated
News
See all related
8
CREATE is a first-of-its-kind partnership between the U.S. Department of Transportation, the state of Illinois, the city of Chicago, Metra, Amtrak and the nation's freight railroads.
The flyover was funded with a combination of federal, state and railroad industry money.
The flyover's completion lays the groundwork for two more CREATE projects. The planned 75th Street Corridor Improvement Project will divert trains on Metra's Southwest Service to the Rock Island District at a point south of Englewood, officials said. Also, the planned Grand Crossing Project will shift six daily Amtrak trains to Norfolk Southern tracks east of Englewood.
Ya, I miss those years enormously!! So much energy, love, hope!!
ReplyDeleteThe Dean campaign awakened so much latent hope… Dum spire, spree--"While I breathe, I hope." They say a year is forever in politics, so perhaps we will live to see the like again. Last night I was reading an opinion piece with the thesis that Irish independence was really the result of a generational change in Irish politics, and suggesting that the political situation in Scotland is analogous. Might the old, tired, hidebound politics of our country be renewed by a generational change? One would hope so, and sooner rather than later. I don't see it yet, but thet's the way it would likely happen, right? A widespread, subtle change, creeping up on all of us across the country, occult until suddenly it snowballs, seemingly out of nowhere, but based upon our society's general feeling of what is right.
ReplyDelete--Alan
Well said, Alan.
DeleteA hearty YES! I was actually thinking of this very possibility last week.
Dum spiro, spero....but you knew that, right?
ReplyDeleteBill--good to hear the railways are getting straightened out in Chicago--and shocked they got into such a mess.
--Alan
P.S.: Easier at work this week than I had expected; I think we're going to make it.