Congestion woes hit Chicagoland

U.S. railroads continue to spend millions of dollars on advertisements claiming they are the solution to traffic congestion, but that's just the opposite of what is happening in the Chicago area.

On Tuesday the federal Surface Transportation Board (STB) released a Canadian National Railway compliance report indicating 50 times in February and March that freight trains blocked vehicle traffic for 10 minutes to three hours at rail crossings along the former Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Railway (EJ&E).  And that's with only two trains using the line each day.

At that pace, Chicagoland residents along the railroad will see 300 traffic jams of at least 10 minutes over the next year. But the railroad hopes to quadruple rail traffic along that line, which could result in 1,200 traffic jams a year. Suburban Chicago and northeastern Illinois residents along the 198-mile line fear that the increased traffic will cause further delays and crossing closings.

"Our big fear is getting an ambulance stuck in a blockage and you have a patient that might not survive," said Karen Darch, village president of Barrington, Ill., in a recent Chicago Tribune article.

The monthly report lists blockages of 10 minutes or more and showed four crossings shut down more than two hours, eight crossings that were closed for more than an hour and one closing that lasted nearly three hours because of mechanical and switching problems

In the same article, Tom Mick, village manager of Park Forest, Ill., said there have always been blocked crossings along the EJ&E and suggested Canadian National's report is underestimating the problem. "Three [blockages in Park Forest] in excess of 10 minutes sounds really low based on my observations in the community," he said.

Since Canadian National began using the tracks on March 11, the reported closings were attributed to operational problems with the tracks and not directly to a rail volume increase.

Prior to STB's approval of Canadian Nationals's $300 million acquisition of the EJ&E in December, several Illinois communities engaged Canadian Northern in a hard-fought legal battle, fearing that increased freight traffic would paralyze their towns. As part of the acquisition, STB requires Canadian National to submit monthly operational reports and quarterly environmental reports to the STB during a five-year oversight period.