16 Comments - Way Northsider - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 8:11 am: Ok:-) - BIG R.PH - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 8:22 am: How ’bout dem Cardinals!!! - Tweed - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 8:33 am: While we are waiting for morning shorts…. No matter if you call yourself a Republican or Democrat, I think we can all push aside partisan differences and unite along geographical lines of I-72 to engage in an argument that (if possible) is based on less facts than political ones: “Which one is more important right now: Bears or Cards?” I personally say Bears. I was born in ‘83 and all I’ve seen the Cards do is choke time and time again in the playoffs. Now I was two when the Bears won the Super Bowl and the 90’s weren’t exactly banner years for the Bears, but all the right pieces are in place this year. - CarolStreamKaren - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 8:40 am: Good. I am glad someone is bright enough to not endorse Giannoulias, whose only qualification for office is his ability to take orders from his father and from Barack Obama. - Tweed - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 8:46 am: I swear when I first posted the morning shorts weren’t up yet and it said “wait a minute”. I’ll post on something that’s actually important to make up for it. That Amtrak story sounds like CN is almost blackmailing the state. I’m not sure what could be done if they pulled out of the deal all of the sudden, but I would favor any and all goverment actions possible. Perhaps CN’s land where it runs rail could be accessed like a 6,000 square foot mansion on the Northwest side… - Anonymous - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 8:53 am: I’ll say it again. Rod Blagojevich is no Rocky Balboa. More like the Andy Kaufman character from Saturaday Night Live. - (618) Democrat - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 9:14 am: I agree with Senator Obama when he said “Alexi Giannoulias is one of the most outstanding young men I could ever hope to meet.” Now that’s an endorsement to be proud of and an endorsement that can make a difference. - Fire Ron Guenther - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 9:16 am: Get Nieuked!!! - Rich Miller - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 9:34 am: “618″ please come up with a new line. The same one over and over again is getting old. I think people here know that Obama is with Alexi. Thankyou. Drive through. - Pat Hickey - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 9:40 am: I’ve got to wonder what Pops Staples said to Kid Staples when Junior wrote the fan letter to Paddy Fitz decrying shenanigans in elective office - Em,Em, Em! What happens when Paddy Fitz lifts the doormat at the Jackson Funhouse? Sonething like . . . ‘Son, step into the den, your mother and I would like a word with you . . .for starters!’ - CarolStreamKaren - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 10:11 am: 618 is just as bad as the rabid right: he will agree with anything Obama says, however vacuous it may be. - Caught Something... - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 10:38 am: Maybe someone should tell Randy Stufflebeam what the actual date of the election is: “He believes that because people have to take more energy and time to write his name and fill in the oval next to it on the ballot when they go to the polls Nov. 5.” –Okay, maybe that is a mistake from the Olney Daily Mail as it’s not an actual quote from him… ““Regardless of what happens November 5, the mission does not change,” he said. “I will remain in the fight.”” —Yep, now that is an actual quote from him… A real candidate would know when election day is at it’s the only thing they’ve thought about for the past 5+months. - cermak_rd - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 11:18 am: Caught, Well good grief, man. The guy’s a write-in candidate. Hopefully he hasn’t been obsessing about the election. Unless he’s gone delusional, he knows he hasn’t a prayer to actually win. He’s campaigning to make a statement. In fact, does anyone know the constitutional provision for filling the Lt. Gov.’s spot if he actually (by some catastrophe/miracle dep on view) were to win? He has stated he has a Lt. Gov candidate, Wright, so do folks have to write-in that too (given that we don’t elect them separately that seems odd) or would Stuff have the right to name anyone to be his Lt. Gov? Or would it be treated as a Lt. Gov vacancy? - Levois - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 11:28 am: Why don’t Amtrak just buy up the tracks? Problem solved. - Tweed - Wednesday, Oct 25, 06 @ 12:30 pm: Levois, First, the tracks aren’t exactly for sale. If CN sold the tracks then it would be their trains that would have second priority and their trains would have to wait while Amtrak trains passed. CN would be less reliable and either lose business to trucking firms or not be able to charge as much because their product wouldn’t be as vaulable. In the worst case scenario, Amtrak could do the same thing and kick them off the tracks. Second, even if CN did want to sell the tracks, Amtrak probably wouldn’t have the money to buy them out. It would be a lot of money and most (if not all) of the funding would have to come from state and national sources. You can argue that the train helps out the entire state, but it would be a tough sell to legislators who don’t have stations in their district. On the national level other states would claim that their tracks deserve better train service too. Illinois would have to give up a lot just to buy the tracks. As much as I would love to see more reliable Amtrak service, I think the price and consequences outweigh the need to spend money in other sectors. At the same time there has to be a middle ground between that and having CN be in the position to make the move they are trying to make. - Six Degrees of Separation - Thursday, Oct 26, 06 @ 12:49 am: The railroads and the government made a deal in 1971 when Amtrak was created. Faced with perpetually money losing passenger runs, they agreed to keep running the trains and allowing Amtrak to use the tracks if the government subsidized the service. Back in the late 80’s the IC (predecessor of CN) tore out most of the double track between University Park and Cairo and replaced it with short passing sidings, with a single main track remaining. No other Amtrak line in IL has this situation except the lightly-traveled-by-freight Joliet-St. Louis line owned by UP. That was OK for the time; the freight business, with the 2 passenger trains, was low enough that capacity was not strained. With NAFTA, the CN buying the IC and opening up a Canada to Gulf rail network, the freight business is now booming. The CN barely has enough capacity for its freights and now the state wants to throw another passenger train in the mix. A passenger train has to run on a schedule, and that series of passing sidings and single track now becomes a scheduling nightmare. Run all the freights at night or off-peak? Perhaps a partial solution, but there are other paying freight customers who demand service and deliveries at their convenience, not the railroad’s. I think the whole situation is a comedy of errors on the state’s and CN’s part, mostly caused by people eager to make a deal while not considering the logistics behind it. The solution? I dunno, but that decision to rip out the tracks is not looking any better with age. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.