Of planes, trains and the Van Galder bus

Add comment September 25th, 2008

I’m off. Getting ready to board the Van Galder bus to Union Station, where I hope to talk to some travelers in the cavernous, busy downtown terminal, where commuters bound for the suburbs mingle with passengers bound for California, New York, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Seattle, Portland, Denver and numerous destinations.

Even if you’ve never been in the station, you’ve seen it in countless movies, including “The Untouchables” and “Derailed.”

While most people fly nowadays, Amtrak is enjoying record ridership as people seek alternatives to high prices of driving and going by air. Amtrak could handle even more passengers if it had the extra coaches and engines, but it lacks the money to buy new ones.

That’s because Congress treats the national passenger train company as an orphan, giving it just enough money each year, about $1 billion , to keep operating. Meanwhile, Uncle Sam will spend $1 billion to build a superhighway connecting I-88 and I-80, the Prairie Parkway long pursued by former U.S. House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert — Denny’s Drive or Hastert Highway.

Photographer Scott Morgan and I leave Chicago, bound for New Orleans at 8 p.m. There are no hurricanes headed for the Gulf Coast this weekend, which is a good thing.