Not sure if this regional rail network is still alive.
https://siteselection.com/issues/202...gs-to-come.cfm
From Site Selection magazine, January 2023
The Shape Of Things To Come
Infrastructure investments drive momentum in the Midwest.
I
llinois Gov. JB Pritzker is happy to point out that his state was ahead of the federal government in making generational investments toward infrastructure development. Pritzker, who was re-elected in November, spearheaded “Rebuild Illinois,” a $45 billion capital improvement project approved by the Illinois legislature during the first months of his first term in office. In August, Gov. Pritzker announced that under Rebuild Illinois, the Illinois Department of Transportation had made more than $8.6 billion in improvements to some 4,422 miles of highway and 412 bridges.
“Since I signed our historic, bipartisan infrastructure program into law,” he said, “Rebuild Illinois has undertaken a massive transformation of our state’s transportation systems.”
And not just that, Pritzker boasts, but now that funds are flowing from the $550 billion federal Infrastructure Act, Illinois, he contends, owns a commanding position for associated funding by already having laid the groundwork for specific road, rail, airport and port projects. The Infrastructure Act, state officials say, has allowed the state to expand projected spending by $4 billion.
“Because we passed Rebuild Illinois two-and-a-half years before, we are actually shovel-ready,” Pritzker said, “We’re in a position to do much more and more quickly.”
Under the year-old Infrastructure Act, Illinois has banked $73 million toward the state’s single most conspicuous transportation project, the $7.1 billion modernization of Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, the world’s fourth busiest. That project recorded a milestone in November when Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg travelled to Chicago to announce that — after a four-plus year environmental review — the ambitious renovation had received final clearance from the Federal Aviation Administration.
“Chicago’s transportation infrastructure,” Buttigieg said at O’Hare, “is what makes this city an economic powerhouse of global importance.”
“We’re in a position to do much more and more quickly.”
— JB Pritzker, Illinois Governor
Projects analyzed under the FAA review include new terminals and concourses, on-airport hotels and airfield and taxiway improvements. With the federal green light, construction is set to begin this spring on two satellite concourses that are to provide more than 1 million sq. ft. of gate and amenity space. The new configuration, said Mayor Lori Lightfoot, will dramatically expand the airport’s ability to accommodate aircraft of all sizes.
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As intriguing as it may sound, do not hold your breath, for the ultimate end-product is a 40-year dream with a projected price tag of up to $162 billion. The plan envisions a 3,000-mile passenger rail network consisting of “pillar corridors” radiating out of Chicago with endpoints in Minneapolis-St. Paul, St. Louis, Indianapolis and Detroit. Trains would run as fast as 125 miles per hour. A “hub and spoke” layout would serve to incorporate destinations as far-flung as Sioux Falls, Des Moines, Milwaukee, Green Bay, Madison, Carbondale, Dayton and Cleveland.
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