(The Louisville Courier-Journal posted the following Associated Press article on its website on April 7.)
INDIANAPOLIS — Passenger train service through Indiana will become even less frequent this summer when Amtrak ends its route from Indianapolis to Louisville.
The last run of the Kentucky Cardinal is scheduled for July 4 because the route has had few passengers since it began in December 1999, Amtrak says.
Amtrak will continue its service between Chicago and Indianapolis once a day in each direction.
But the decision to drop the Cardinal route has angered passenger-rail advocates in Louisville, where the city spent $370,000 in 2001 to renovate its Union Station.
Amtrak, the advocates said, never gave the service a chance.
”We are forming a task force next week to save the train,” Jon Owen, head of Kentucky-Indiana Rail Advocates, told The Indianapolis Star. ”There is still time. The fat lady hasn’t sung yet.”
Amtrak made its decision after it stopped carrying freight cars on the route and ridership has been too low to keep it running, spokeswoman Karina Vanveen said.
Even supporters acknowledge that the Louisville-Indianapolis route is one of the most inconvenient of any Amtrak route.
The tracks between Louisville and Indianapolis are in such disrepair that the train cannot travel faster than 30 mph and it takes five hours to travel the 120 miles.
The one-coach train leaves Louisville nightly at 9:20 p.m. and arrives in Indianapolis at 2:30 a.m. Its only other stop is in Jeffersonville.
Travelers continuing to Chicago have a two-hour layover at Union Station in Indianapolis and do not arrive there until 9 a.m.
”The leg between Louisville and Chicago is really bad,” Owen said. ”There is no sleeper car and no food service.”
Nick Noe, Midwest regional director for the Rail Passengers Association, said the ride was rough and that frequently only about 10 passengers were on the train. From October through February, 6,624 people rode the Louisville-to-Chicago route.
Peter Gilbertson, chairman of the board of Louisville and Indiana Railroad, which owns the track through Southern Indiana, said the company never had the financial assistance it needed to replace the tracks.
L&I bought the tracks from Conrail in 1994 and has invested $10 million in improvements. Replacing the 50-year-old tracks would cost $40 million.
”The joints are bent and don’t permit high speeds on them,” Gilbertson said. ”We’ve talked to the state Department of Transportation and some cities about getting some grants, but it just seems like there isn’t a lot of interest in it.”
”The leg between Louisville and Chicago is really bad. There is no sleeper car and no food service.”