(The following story by Erik Potter appeared on the Post-Tribune website on September 19.)
CHICAGO — The Canadian National Railway Co. filed suit in federal court Thursday to try to force a regulatory decision on its proposed purchase of the Gary-based Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Railway Co. before the end of the year.
CN is asking the court to require the federal Surface Transportation Board do what it declined to do last week, which is offer a decision on CN’s proposed transaction before the board’s environmental review is complete.
CN wants the transportation board to issue a decision on the EJ&E purchase based on its effects on rail transportation, then issue conditions on that approval later when its environmental study is finished.
CN would agree to operate the EJ&E line at “status quo levels” until the environmental study is done.
The transportation board decided last week it would not follow such a process, saying it was at odds with the National Environmental Policy Act and that CN did not show how they could guarantee “status quo” operations.
CN is now hoping that that court will decide otherwise.
“Given the substantial, wide-ranging public interest benefits of our planned acquisition of the EJ&E, we cannot permit regulatory delay to imperil this transaction,” said CN President and Chief Executive Officer E. Hunter Harrison in a written statement released to the press.
Local residents have opposed the sale because of the extra train traffic it would bring.
CN has been trying to buy the U.S. Steel-owned EJ&E since October and has been frustrated with the pace of the transportation board’s review.
CN wants to use the EJ&E line, which loops around Chicago, to divert traffic away from the city’s congested core, improving the efficiency of CN’s rail network.
Many Chicago neighborhoods and inner suburbs would enjoy fewer trains through their towns, while communities along the EJ&E would see large increases in the number and size of trains on their tracks.