Passenger Trains > Chicago West Loop Trains

It was a gorgeous but very windy day in Chicago. I took a long walk during lunch over to Kinzie Street west of Des Plaines Avenue as construction is winding up on the reconstruction of Kinzie Street. Since I was the project manager for the design team, I wanted to see what the new street looked like. On the way over, I was interrupted by an inbound Amtrak train from Milwaukee lead by NPCU 90221. After the passing of the Amtrak train, the gates came back down for an outbound Metra train led by 106 

Heading west on Kinzie takes one past the Blommer Chocolate factory. Today a tank car was spotted on the end of their spur track. 

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Just a few shots of the new section of Kinzie Street. The south half of the right-of-way used to have an easement for the old CNW Carroll Avenue line that at one time went all the way east to Navy Pier. The easement has since reverted back to the city which enabled us to widen the road to provide sorely needed parking and a sidewalk on the south side of Kinzie. We also re-purposed part of the steel structure that used to carry the CNW tracks over the Kennedy Expressway. In the first shot, the joint between the two structure is under the center median. The old RR bridge is under the Benz.

 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/27/16 20:09 by kevink.

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Nice Veterans paint  job on a F40PH

Really interesting Kevin!  You definitely know your city well.

Neat shots. That street sure did change in the last shot. It is one of the places I go to find free parking, and if I recall it was riddled with potholes and much narrower.

inCHI Wrote:
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> Neat shots. That street sure did change in the
> last shot. It is one of the places I go to find
> free parking, and if I recall it was riddled with
> potholes and much narrower.

Here's a couple of before shots."Riddled with potholes" is no exaggeration. Note the rails from a long abandoned industry track

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Great shots and back story, Kevin, on the road/ bridge improvements, too.
Still remember shooting the CNW/ MILW AM rush hour in March '78 and smelling that wonderful Blommer's chocolate factory nearby-- glad to see they're still in business!