Alton Will See Boost in Amtrak Service

By Dennis Grubaugh, The Telegraph, Alton, Ill.

May 11–ALTON — The state budget is pulling into the city’s Amtrak station, and residents are climbing aboard. This fall, passengers will have two more trains to hop on each day on the Chicago-to-St. Louis line, which passes through Alton.

“You would see an increase from three Amtraks a day to five Amtraks a day, a greater convenience to the people of Alton and the county surrounding it,” said Matt Vanover, a spokesman for the Illinois Department of Transportation.

The number of trains also would increase from one to two a day on the Chicago-to-Carbondale and Chicago-to-Quincy lines.

IDOT contracts with Amtrak on regular rail passenger service throughout Illinois. The current contract is for $12.1 million and supports service that includes one daily round trip between Chicago and Quincy, Chicago and Carbondale and Chicago and St. Louis, as well as several round trips between Chicago and Milwaukee, which Illinois partners with Wisconsin to provide.

Under the state budget for fiscal year 2007, funding would increase to $24 million.

The added trains will be finalized through contract negotiations with Amtrak, which for years has struggled to stay afloat nationally. Whether the additional trains will be offered five, six or seven days a week is part of the negotiations.

“I already spoke with Amtrak’s acting president, David Hughes, several weeks ago, and he indicated their support to make this happen, and I want to thank (U.S.) Sen. (Dick) Durbin for his active role,” IDOT Secretary Timothy W. Martin said in a statement. “This is the first time in more than a decade that a Midwestern state has expanded Amtrak service and puts us second only to California in terms of state operating assistance.”

Vanover said the extra trains will make it more convenient for people to come to Madison County.

“Alton could be more of a destination now for those people who previously didn’t want to get on the train because the schedule wasn’t conducive,” he said. “Now, they might come, have a couple of hours before their next train and spend some time in Alton, maybe get something to eat, do a little shopping and hop back on.”

The same impact could be felt in Carlinville, another historic community on the Amtrak line, Vanover said.

State Rep. Dan Beiser, D-Alton, is happy with the idea of more trains to and from Alton.

“I think there is a need, because the only train now that is on time is the very early one, the 5:19departure from Alton to Chicago,” he said.

That is also the only train that originates in St. Louis heading north. The other trains go on to other points on the Amtrak line, such as Texas.

“Just today, I was at a coffee (gathering), and a woman got a call from Amtrak telling her that her train was going to be seven hours late to Alton,” Beiser said Wednesday. “They were going to load them all up on buses and leave that way.”

Beiser said Amtrak is dealing with railroad line owners on scheduling the additional trains. The eventual timetable will depend largely on what doesn’t conflict with freight use of the lines.

The Midwest High Speed Rail Association, an industry group, praised the Amtrak funding.

“Illinois will be the first state to have extra rail mobility ready in time for gasoline price increases,” Executive Director Rick Harnish said in a statement. “Illinois’ legislators and governor have shown an unusual degree of forward thinking in agreeing to such a steep ramp-up in service. While elected officials in other states were still scratching their heads about what to do about high gasoline prices, Gov. Blagojevich and the Illinois General Assembly did something about it.”

Although 13 states now provide Amtrak with funding to support their passenger-rail corridors, none has ever voted to double its service at one time, Harnish said.

He said the state’s busiest inter-city rail corridor is the 284-mile line between Chicago and St. Louis.

“For the first time, there will be an early-morning express from Chicago that will get travelers to Springfield around 10 a.m.,” Harnish said.

He said a coalition of universities, chambers of commerce and many mayors and statewide leaders had urged elected leaders to take the action.

He singled out the United Transportation Union and the Environmental Law and Policy Center as the association’s “partners” in a two-year advocacy campaign.

Harnish said the tourism factor could serve upstate, as well, with more people from the Alton market heading to Chicago or to Springfield to see such sites as the new Abraham Lincoln Library.

State support alone cannot provide the passenger trains necessary for Illinois’ economic development, Harnish said.

“So, the next phase of our campaign must be to persuade our congressional delegation and the Bush administration to support a federal/state matching fund program that will raise the capital needed to build new tracks, signals, stations and rolling stock,” he said.

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