New Amtrak high speed rail between Chicago and St. Louis

Posted on June 27, 2023
The Chicago-St Louis run is now less than five hours, thanks to the $2 billion project, mostly from federal dollars. (Photo Facebook/Governor JB Pritzker)

By Dave Dahl

CHICAGO – Celebrating the first Amtrak trains going 110 mph between Chicago and St. Louis, U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) reached into the Steve Goodman / Arlo Guthrie songbook.

“City of New Orleans,” Durbin recounts, evokes a time when passenger rail travel was not nearly so promising. “Steve Goodman was a songwriter and a Chicago folk singer,” said Durbin. “In 1970, he convinced Arlo Guthrie to make that song a national hit. The lyrics of that song are memorable: 15 cars, 15 restless riders, three conductors, 25 sacks of mail.”

The Chicago-St Louis run is now less than five hours, thanks to the $2 billion project, mostly from federal dollars.

Dave Dahl can be reached at [email protected]

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