(The following story by Bob Okon appeared on the Herald News website on September 12.)
JOLIET — Opponents to the Canadian National Railway plan questioned why the company should be allowed to profit at the expense of local residents and taxpayers.
Frankfort Mayor Jim Holland even accused the Montreal-based railroad of seeking taxpayer subsidies for a venture that ultimately will take jobs away from workers in the United States because Canadian National is expanding port operations in Canada.
“A tax subsidy for the CN is detrimental to the United States citizens,” Holland said, receiving a standing ovation from the crowd at a public hearing on the railroad’s plan to take over the Elgin, Joliet & Eastern Railway.
The crowd, like most of those at previous hearings on the railroad merger, was definitely partisan.
The hearing was held by the Surface Transportation Board, the federal regulatory agency that must approve the CN plan for the merger to go forward.
Officials and residents from Plainfield, New Lenox, Mokena and Naperville pointed to a large increase in train traffic that would come with the merger, while CN has been unwilling to fund more than 5 to 10 percent of the high cost of building separated rail crossings that would ease the impact on roads.
“The CN expects the U.S. taxpayers to pick up the cost,” Holland said.
Federal regulators typically expect railroads to fund only 5 percent of the cost of crossing improvements, based largely on the reasoning that the railroads were there first.
But Plainfield Village Administrator Alex Harris noted that his village is the oldest in Will County.
“The village of Plainfield,” Harris noted, “was actually here prior to the railroad.”
New Lenox resident John Petrosky said objection to CN does not stem from a “not in my backyard” mentality. “The tracks are already there,” he said.
“It seems unreasonable,” Petrosky said, “that we should be expected to accommodate a 40 percent increase in traffic on the rails and be expected to pay for it with our tax dollars.”
Unpopular support
The CN did have a supporter Thursday night in Jack Lanigan, chairman of Mi-Jack Products, a Hazel Crest-based company that manufactures products for the rail industry.
Lanigan said the CN plan will relieve regional rail congestion because fewer trains will run on tracks closer to Chicago. He also pointed out that CN has a U.S. headquarters in south suburban Homewood.
“CN is as much a U.S. company as it is a Canadian company,” Lanigan said.
He did not get applause.