Iowa City to Chicago rail service won't get stimulus funds

With passenger trains picking up speed in 31 states, Dick Welch is worried Iowans are left at the station.

“I'm very, very disappointed,” said Welch, of Swisher. “We had worked so hard, a lot of people.”

Proposals to restore passenger trains between Chicago and Iowa City and Dubuque, could still be funded as soon as February. But Welch is joined in his disappointment by Gov. Chet Culver and state transportation officials that the plans weren't included in stimulus funding to improve and expand passenger rail service across the country.

“Many, many people including myself thought we had a very good chance of getting one or the other funded,” said Welch, Iowa's representative to the National Association of Railroad Passengers and a member of the Iowa Department of Transportation's rail planning committee.

Iowa's share of the $8 billion in stimulus funding announced late Wednesday night by the White House: $18.3 million to speed Amtrak's California Zephyr across southern Iowa and for a study of Chicago-Omaha service on the Iowa Interstate Railroad's tracks via the Quad Cities, Iowa City, and Des Moines.

Left out: $233 million for Chicago-Iowa City service and $139 million for a new Chicago-Dubuque run.

Culver said he was also disappointed, but he and IDOT officials are optimistic the Iowa routes will be included in future rounds of funding.

“These are sound projects that will help the people of this state, and with the work we have already done, we will be competitive for future rounds of funding,” Culver said in a statement issued by his office. “I am confident that an expanded passenger rail system is in Iowa's future.”

“We're excited that we got some funding and that will move us a step ahead, but we're disappointed we didn't get the two big projects funded,” said Tammy Nicholson, IDOT rail projects planner.

Nicholson hopes a separate request for $1.5 billion in federal money for Iowa highways and rail service will be approved. That application includes funds for the new Amtrak routes. The U.S. Department of Transportation is to distribute those funds by Feb. 17.

Iowa's rail stimulus funding includes $17.3 million to install crossovers on the BNSF near Ottumwa, allowing trains to shift from one parallel track to another to meet or pass slower trains. That should mean faster travel between Chicago and Omaha on the Zephyr, the Chicago-Oakland, Calif., train that stops in Burlington, Mount Pleasant, Ottumwa, Osceola, and Creston.

The remaining $1 million will go toward the Chicago-Omaha study, which Nicholson said will both build on and supplement work already done on the Chicago-Iowa City service.

“The work we'll be doing for Chicago to Omaha will better position Iowa for future rounds of funding, and we know there will be future rounds,” she said.

Still, “this has got to be at least the fourth study of that route going back to the early 1990s,” said Welch. “How many times do we have to study the same thing?”