Comment EI-24854
Received or sent (printed as 7/14/2016)
The Patten-proposed rail bypass around Chicago, originating in Kingsbury, Indiana and extending through Illinois into Wisconsin, is, in our opinion, a project that is exceptionally destructive environmentally. Its eastern terminus would be adjacent to the Kingsbury Fish and Wildlife area. A similarly proposed interchange yard at this terminus would impact, if not destroy, this 6000 acre conservation area. Our group, the Woodland Savanna Land Conservancy, owns a small parcel adjacent, which would also be impacted or destroyed. Dozens of homes have been build along the nearby 500 South in LaPorte County, extending from Kingsbury west into Porter County. The rail line would go on the long-abandoned Wabash tracks directly behind these homes, in their back yards, a distance of several miles. These homeowners are middle to low income, doubtless with little political influence to stop this ill-conceived idea. Chicago's CREATE project is addressing rail congestion in that city. Rail carloadings are down some seven percent this year, due to a reduction in coal usage that is predicted to continue. No Class One railroad that we know of has endorsed this project. CN has already contracted a bypass using existing rail lines. Moreover, CP has said that the existing IHB railroad could be used as a bypass, if anyone were interested. An interstate highway proposal parallel to a section of the rail route in Illinois was recently halted by the state as unwarranted. Patten, a man as elderly as I am, has an if we build it they will come" attitude. He has hatched this speculative project, inexplicably armed with eminent domain, that would result in vulgar environmental degradation and family disruption along much or most of its nearly 300 mile route. We ask that you do not allow this project to proceed, or indeed any similar schemes with alternate routes. We who live in the Chicago area already have an abundance of rail corridors, some of them seemingly underused. Garland F. Hicks, Jr. VP and Founder Woodland Savanna Land Conservancy, 501(c)3"
Submitted by: Hicks, Garland F. Jr. · Woodland Savanna Land Conservancy
The Board publishes this comment in its environmental-comment table for this proceeding. It is quoted here as printed; nothing is inferred from it, and it states the commenter's own position in their own words, not this record's.
Permanent address docketyard.org/d/FD-35952/comment/EI-24854 · back to the docket sheet