SKEWING THE BENEFIT-COST RATIO? The editorial board of the DeKalb Chronicle object to the Illinois Department of Transportation choosing the more convoluted Big Timber - Belvidere - Rockport routing to Galena and beyond.

That’s when, after months of debate, the Illinois Department of Transportation, in an application for federal funding, selected a route that would run through Genoa rather than a route through Belvidere that was endorsed by [state senator Bradley] Burzynski and pushed hard by Rockford regional officials.

IDOT officials cited an Amtrak study that showed the route through Genoa would cost less to upgrade, be less cumbersome to develop and would carry more riders. But when the project failed to get approval for funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, both the funding decision and the route was back in the state’s hands.

The editors properly question the rationale, endorsed by state senator Bradley Burzynski, that the routing would make a future extension of Metra commuter train service to Rockford possible. That rationale is questionable, as Boone and Winnebago counties would have to become part of the Metra tax district, or to set up a passenger transport authority to purchase service from Metra, to make the scoots happen. (The tax district has perpetually been a hard sell in DeKalb County, where there is a large population of potential passengers at Northern Illinois University.)