DULUTH, Minn. — After a day of meetings with local officials, an Amtrak executive promised Monday that the passenger railroad is “going to deliver” on proposed service between Duluth and Minneapolis-St. Paul.
Joe McHugh, Amtrak’s vice president, state-supported business development, told the Duluth News-Tribune that the proposed 152-mile, 2 ½-hour Northern Lights Express is “in the sweet spot” of Amtrak’s preference for trains that run between 150 and 300 miles and take four hours for less.
McHugh was in Duluth on Monday, and will be at the state capitol today, as part of efforts to revive passenger service on the route. [See “Amtrak, Minnesota officials meet on proposed Duluth-Twin Cities train,” Trains News Wire, March 11, 2019.] While no operating agreements were signed, McHugh said meetings would continue, and that Amtrak would help local supporters navigate the grant process to help launch the service. Estimates are that it would take $550 million to make the necessary route improvements to allow service to begin.
Supporters are optimistic about the efforts to launch the service.
“Every time we have put this project in the news it has ganed more and more support,” Superior, Wis., Mayor Jim Paine told the paper.
Some decades ago I was reviewing actual station numbers for daily boardings/detrainings at individual stations. Interesting how some very small communities (Montpelier, Vermont) would have far more people on and off than an intermediate city like Youngstown, Ohio. So absolute populations of endpoints down not predict high or low ridership.
This train has been tried before. It worked before the I-35 corridor but will not work now. There just aren’t enough people willing to give up their cars to make this work again. Although the dream of a Twin Cities/Duluth train is a wonderful pipe dream (and I would like to smoke some of that stuff too) IT WON’T WORK!!
Michael – So noted, your point about Minnesota rail advocates wanting to double the frequency Twin Cities to Chicago. No argument there! Maybe take part of that $550 million and put it toward the improvements needed for the Hiawatha in Lake – Cook corridor, Illinois
Mr. Matalis,
The question is how many people regularly between the Twin Cities and the Twin Ports? And how many of them would use a service that provides one train per day in each direction? I’m sure there are such people, but are there enough to make this a better expenditure than using the money elsewhere?
Minnesota passenger advocacy group All Aboard Minnesota is also promoting the doubling of service between Chicago and the Twin Cities.
I really get the impression that I lot of people look at a routing like this and think “Well that’s somewhere I wouldn’t go” and then assume that everyone else thinks the same. The people who regularly travel between Duluth/Superior and the Twin cities probably think differently.
For $550 Million I could come up with a train that some people might ride. Amtrak can’t go everywhere so it should focus on corridors with multiple frequencies. The entire state of Minnesota has one train. How about doubling the frequency in that corridor? Why go looking for more routes?
Everyone says the most likely new rail passenger routes will link mega-cities. This proposal doesn’t seem to fit that formula.
George Rohde: To answer your question, my take on this is that there is some dumb politicians (Are there any other kind?) who think they can get some more camera time and resulting votes if they push for this line that runs from one city through sparsely populated woods communities to another small city. Just look at all the ridiculous Amtrak lines that carry few people. Yet there is no service to Phoenix, Nashville, Las Vegas and even when there is service it is usually poorly run like Empire Builder service to the Twin Cities from Chicago. Now the idiots are wanting service from Pittsfield, Mass. to NYC over a route that goes west and north before it heads south The Brunswick extension of the Downeaster in Maine is a total failure. Yet this lunacy continues. And guess who pays for most of it? YOU!!
Could someone tell me why they need $550 M in improvements to a line that ran the North Star back in the 80’s on the same line?
This is pretty back of the envelope but let’s say 17,000 vehicles per day each containing an average of 1.5 people equals 25,500 people. Amtrak carries 1/2 of 1% of intercity travelers and that includes the urban corridors which this is not so it is probably high but let’s leave it. That equals about 128 passengers per day divided over 4 trains equals 32 passengers per train. Not even a bus load. Like I said this is nothing more than an estimate on the back of an envelope but I wouldn’t be too surprised if it is close. Take that $550 million and put it towards a second Chicago train. No brainer.
People aren’t always looking for the quickest way to go between two points, quite often they just want to get out from behind the wheel, kick back and do something besides watching the lane markers pass by.
If this train ever comes to fruition. Talgo sets running non-stop between the Twin Cities and Twin Ports would only make sense. If this train makes stops in between these points the service is useless..
The Twin Cities has a combined population of about 729,000., the Twin Ports is around 112,000. According to MNDot I35 between those two points is handling roughly 16,000 to 17,000 vehicles a day, so yes, there are a lot of people traveling between those two points.
I’d like to take a moment to point out that the proposed service calls for 4 daily trains, not one.