Railway Age, 10/14/21
Chicago Cooperation=More Midwest Trains?
Written by David Peter Alan, Contributing Editor
In an unusual twist of circumstances, there are three events ongoing at this writing that have a lot to say about Amtrak corridors and trains in the Midwest. All were scheduled to take place within a three-day span.
The first occurred on Oct. 13. It was a press conference in Chicago that featured officials from Amtrak, the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) and the Midwest Interstate Passenger Rail Commission (MIPRC).
At this writing, the second event is in progress. It is the MIPRC’s annual meeting in Detroit, taking place Oct. 14-15. The agenda will focus on the report unveiled at the Oct. 13 event and how the cooperating agencies hope to bring more trains and corridors to the region. Also on Oct. 15, there will be a virtual mini-conference sponsored by the Rail Users’ Network (RUN), a nationwide rider-advocacy group that calls for improvements at Amtrak, more rail transit and better connectivity between the two. Ironically, the theme of that conference will be “You can’t get there from here!—the Midwest’s missing passenger connections and what’s being done about them.”
In a sense, all of those events have focused or will focus on efforts to improve the region’s passenger rail network by bringing more trains to serve its population.
David Peter Alan is one of America’s most experienced transit users and advocates, having ridden every rail transit line in the U.S., and most Canadian systems. He has also ridden the entire Amtrak network and most of the routes on VIA Rail. His advocacy on the national scene focuses on the Rail Users’ Network (RUN), where he has been a Board member since 2005. Locally in New Jersey, he served as Chair of the Lackawanna Coalition for 21 years, and remains a member. He is also a member of NJ Transit’s Senior Citizens and Disabled Residents Transportation Advisory Committee (SCDRTAC). When not writing or traveling, he practices law in the fields of Intellectual Property (Patents, Trademarks and Copyright) and business law. The opinions expressed here are his own.