By Larry Sandler
For WisBusiness.com
Two passenger rail ideas once left for dead — a Kenosha-Racine-Milwaukee commuter line and an Amtrak route from Milwaukee to Madison — are back on the study track.
Should these and other proposals come to fruition, passenger trains could one day link eight of Wisconsin’s 10 largest cities to each other, Chicago and Minneapolis-St. Paul.
Milwaukee is now the only one of those top 10 cities with Amtrak service.
Advocates say the proposed routes could stimulate investment and help workers reach jobs. If the southeastern Wisconsin commuter line dubbed KRM was established, “some of the poorest neighborhoods in this region would be connected to over 400,000 jobs within 30 minutes of public transit,” says Trevor Jung, Racine’s transit and mobility director. “That would be life-altering.”
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