Passenger Rail task force members include former Peoria mayor

Richard Neumiller, former mayor of Peoria and member of the now defunct railroad commission, is on a new passenger rail task force put together by the Tri-County Regional Planning Commission (TCRPC). Neumiller was appointed by Mayor Jim Ardis to represent Peoria on the task force. Here is the full list of task force members, provided by the TCRPC:

Illinois River Valley Council of Governments

City of Peoria Dick Neumiller
Village of Bartonville Rhonda Wolfe
City of Chillicothe Randy Stevens
Limestone Township Bob Lawless
Tazewell County Clint Drury
City of Pekin Steve Brown
City of East Peoria Ty Livingston
Village of Morton Norm Durflinger
Washington Township Gary Manier
Woodford County John Krug
Village of Roanoke Kevin Braker
City of Eureka Marc Pasteris
Village of Metamora Bill Belshaw
Woodford County Township Gayl Wyss
Peoria County Paul Feltenstein

Tri-County Regional Planning Commission

Stephen Van Winkle John Blossom
Russ Crawford James Polk
Dean Grimm  

Bloomington Normal

Mark Peterson, Town of Normal
Aaron Quick, City of Bloomington

Ex-officio Members

Steve Jaeger, HOI Port District
Larry Koch

If you’re counting, you may notice that there are 22 members (not including ex-officio members), not 21 as stated in the Journal Star the other day. For more information on the Illinois River Valley Council of Governments, see the TCRPC’s overview here.

I caught up with Terry Kohlbuss, executive director of TCRPC, and we had a good discussion regarding the task force’s plans to establish a link between Peoria and Bloomington. On the positive side, they still see a direct passenger rail connection between Peoria and Chicago as the ultimate goal. That’s important, because it means they are still awaiting the Amtrak-IDOT report and are not trying to second-guess its conclusions. However, where we disagree is on the strategy for meeting that ultimate goal. As stated in my previous post, the task force wants to pursue a link with the Bloomington Amtrak station first — starting with carpooling, then vans, then buses, then a passenger rail shuttle, and eventually direct service via Bloomington to Chicago.

I still fear that such a strategy is too risky. Rail service from Peoria to Bloomington will not produce high ridership, and given the cost of establishing Peoria-Chicago service, low ridership between Peoria and Bloomington could be used by politicians to justify killing passenger rail here before a direct link to Chicago can be established. I’m afraid decision-makers would not conclude that Peoria-Bloomington service is unpopular, but that rail service in general is unpopular and unsupported. That would be a real tragedy that would set Peoria back thirty years.

A better strategy would be to establish direct service between Peoria and Chicago first — which will produce high ridership numbers — and use that success to add more rail lines in the future, perhaps even an east-west route like the one being proposed by the task force, especially if it could be extended to Champaign.

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