Advocates push for passenger rail route through Fox Valley

From an article by Steve Wideman in the Appleton Post-Crescent:

APPLETON — Local passenger rail advocates want Amtrak to establish an experimental passenger train route between Chicago and Green Bay.

Bringing passenger trains back to the Fox Valley would connect this area to the world economy and significantly reduce the carbon footprint of travelers, said a spokesman for NEWRails, a group dedicated to renewing passenger rail service after a 39-year absence.

"We could transport people from here and get them connected to Chicago, one of the biggest economic engines in the country and the world. That's an incredibly powerful thing to have," said Paul Linzmeyer, president of NEWRails and a founder of New North, an economic development consortium of 18 northeastern Wisconsin counties.

The last passenger train traveled through the Fox Valley on April 30, 1971.

"What if Chicago gets the 2016 Olympics? If we had a passenger rail system in northeast Wisconsin we could be a part of that whole venue," Linzmeyer said.

NEWRails leaders brought their rail travel wish list to Appleton last week, including a plan to convince state transportation leaders to ask federal officials to approve an experimental Amtrak route on existing Canadian National Railway tracks with local stops in Appleton, Neenah and Menasha, Oshkosh and Fond du Lac.