Tag Archives: Chicago

City of Peoria, Transportation

Spoof shows absurdity of train to Normal

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Outrage. Disbelief. Skepticism. These were all feelings people told me they had while reading my April Fools Day post — a mock news report saying all Peoria flights would be going through Bloomington’s airport.

Everybody recognizes that flying to Bloomington and switching planes would be silly. Those who fly want direct flights to major hub cities, like Chicago.

Yet local leaders are actively pursuing something equally absurd: a passenger train to Normal. Instead of pursuing a direct route to Chicago, local leaders are all too willing to settle for a shuttle to the twin cities where passengers can switch to another train that will then take them to Chicago.

It will never work. People take the train to save time and money. A train into Chicago saves time since gridlock traffic can be averted getting into the city. Money is saved because a round-trip ticket is less than the cost to park in Chicago, let alone the cost of gas to drive there.

But going from Peoria to Chicago via a connecting train in Bloomington will add considerable time and expense — time and expense that can be avoided by simply driving to Bloomington and parking for free. And that’s what people will do.

The city should be pursuing direct passenger rail service to Chicago, not a shuttle to Bloomington-Normal. For additional reasons, see David Jordan’s posts on this topic here and here.

St. Louis Cardinals

Good to be back

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Hello, everyone. I’ve been in Chicago the past couple of days. Did I miss anything while I was gone?

Of course, when I say I was “in Chicago,” what I really mean is, I was in the northwest suburbs — Elk Grove Village, to be exact. I went up for some work-related training.

But while I was there, you’ll never guess what I did. I went to a Cubs game. Yep, the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field. Not only that, but the night I was there (Tuesday, 9/1), they won! I think just having a Cardinals fan in the house brought them good luck against another Central Division rival.

I have to admit, I really like Wrigley Field. It’s a neighborhood ballpark. It really is. You go in there, and there’s this feeling like you’re all friends, these are all your neighbors, and you’re just hanging out at the ballgame, like people might hang out at the Chiefs game here in Peoria (except that the tickets are about six times as much at Wrigley). We had great seats, too — right behind home plate, about 20 rows back.

With such a great ballpark that, thankfully, has not been torn down or abandoned yet, it’s really a shame that the Cubs organization can’t seem to field a team that’s a real contender. But on the other hand, if they ever did, then the Cubs might get more popular, and then they’d have to build a bigger, newer, fancier stadium somewhere else in Chicago, and ticket prices would go up, and… well, things just wouldn’t be the same.

Incidentally, all during the game, I kept my eye on the manual scoreboard out in center field. I watched as they updated the score on the St. Louis – Milwaukee game. The Cardinals, of course, won. Again. It’s been three years since the Cards won the World Series. It’s about time for them to bring home the trophy again.

Amtrak

Amtrak study delayed… again

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Amtrak LogoIt was back in 2007 that we first started talking about Amtrak and IDOT doing a feasibility study on a possible Chicago-Peoria route. The study was going to be completed by late 2007, then early 2008. Then there were a number of delays. By the end of 2008, Amtrak/IDOT officials were promising it would be done by March 2009. Then they pushed it back to “summer.” Now we’ve been informed that the Amtrak study has been pushed back to “at least” this fall.

Over the past several years, ridership has risen dramatically and interest in establishing new routes has increased; plus, there’s a serious effort underway to establish high-speed rail service. However, all this interest in passenger rail in addition to existing freight traffic is starting to put a strain on capacity, especially around Chicago. So, some capacity studies have been ordered (i.e., a study to see if another train can be added to some already busy segments of the route, or whether those segments are at capacity), which is adding more time and expense to the feasibility study.

One idea that has been bandied about is setting up a rail shuttle between Peoria and Normal. Such a shuttle wouldn’t be a direct connection between Peoria and Chicago, but rather a connection to the train depot in Normal, from which one could connect to a Chicago-bound or St. Louis-bound train.

I’m skeptical of this idea. The amount of time it would take to travel between Peoria and Normal, plus the layover, plus the hassle of switching trains — I just don’t believe that such a shuttle would attract enough ridership to make it feasible. Peoria is the third-largest metropolitan statistical area in the state. There’s really no reason we shouldn’t have direct passenger rail service to Chicago.