Illinois-Sponsored Trains Get a Momentary Reprieve

[C855B]

As a few might be aware, Illinois has been in a protracted state budget battle, with some concerns about most in-state trains being cut. An agreement was reached, per this local news article (http://wjbdradio.com/LocalNews/Amtrak-to-Keep-Two-Daily-Round-Trip-Trains-on-Chicago-to-Carbondale-Route):

The Illinois Department of Transportation and Amtrak have announced they have reached an agreement to keep existing service levels on state-supported routes at a savings to taxpayers and without having to raise fares on the downstate Illinois Routes.

Under the plan, two daily round trips will remain in place on the Chicago to Carbondale line that stops in Centralia and Effingham. Two daily round trips will also remain between Chicago and Quincy and four daily round trips between Chicago and St. Louis.

To keep the schedule in place for the rest of the fiscal year that ends June 30th, IDOT negotiated the use of credits to lower its annual payments to Amtrak. The credits cover previous equipment upgrades IDOT paid for on Amtrak's behalf as well as earlier state investments to establish onboard Wi-FI service. The state also negotiated a $2.7-million reduction from Amtrak's original request for equipment maintenance for the year.

 

[Palmetto]

As I have read it, the new governor got lots of flak on this issue from mayors as well as universities. Probably will go down as one of the lousiest decisions

of his [hopefully] single term.

 

[neroden]

There's a lot of competition for the title of "lousiest decision" by Rauner.

 

[Bob Dylan]

There's a lot of competition for the title of "lousiest decision" by Rauner.

Also for the residents of Illinois for electing this Clown!

 

[MikefromCrete]

A lot of people on railfan-orientated sites have been proclaiming Rauner as "anti-rail." I don't think he is. He probably is only vaguely aware that Illinois sponsors passenger trains. When he took office he ordered everything cut, and this was the same time that Amtrak was implementing its new system for state subsidies -- and raising the cost of its contract. Rauner is, however, anti-union and is out to break the public employee unions in the state (just like his hero, Scott Walker) and well as implement right to work laws to undermine private sector unions. The Democratic-conrolled legislature is not about to let him to do that and so we have a stalemate of epic proportions. The state's budget crisis could be resolved quickly if Rauner backed down from the anti-union parts of his "turnaround" proposals. Rauner never made his anti-union beliefs a major part of his campaign (preferring to be an au-sucks "man of the people" in his campaign ads). Hopefully he will be a one-termer, either by defeat in election or just quitting after he finds he can't run the state like he ran his many corporations.

 

[MisterUptempo]

Well, with any luck, perhaps Rauner will have the opportunity to follow many of his predecessors, of both political parties, into a federal corrections facility - hopefully before he turns Illinois into North Mississippi.

One question I have - Are the budget/funding nightmares the reason we have yet to see a Tier 2 EIS for the Chicago-Joliet segment of the Lincoln Service? From everything I've seen, I was under the impression that a Draft EIS should have been made available in Spring, 2015, with a Final EIS due in Autumn, 2015. Did that schedule change?

Image - courtesy IDOT