As with the American deserts, famil-
iarity with the Midwest is liable to breed love or contempt, or perhaps both. The region certainly has the ingredients for a love-hate relationship — beautiful days in summer and fall that rival anything the West Coast has to offer coupled with a breath-taking landscape of greens and earth tones on the one hand. On the oth- er hand there are bitterly cold winters chock-full of wind-whipped snowdrifts and black ice, followed by oppressively humid summers with rains that regular- ly cause rivers to overflow their banks. Aesthetics aside, the Midwest is not a place for the faint of heart when it comes to the weather.
The center of the country features
more than just seasonal contrasts. The metropolises of Chicago, Kansas City, St. Louis, and Indianapolis constitute huge urban spaces, yet are dwarfed by the immensity of farm country that sur- rounds them. Coursing through its cities and hinterland are a bounty of railroad lines that at one time were owned by scores of independent companies, but which now fall under the ownership of one of the U.S.’s mega-systems, region- als, or short lines (which are often part of a consortium). Most of those railroad lines cross and follow a number of signif- icant rivers, including the Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio.
RIGHT: On the sunny afternoon of July 3, 2009, a Metra commuter train off of Union Pacific’s “Northwest Line” pushes into Chicago’s Union Station. On the other side of the train is the Chicago River, which laces the entire downtown district of the Windy City with boat traffic. BELOW: In the final evening of January 2009, Metra coaches sit in the chill silence of the yard at Aurora, Ill. BNSF operates the commuter service for Metra, including supplying engineers and conductors, between Aurora and Union Station in downtown Chicago.
50 APRIL 2015 •
RAILFAN.COM
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