UNION PATHETIC. The Superintendent has not been impressed with Union Pacific's hostility to passenger trains, repeatedly calling readers' attention to the existence of a railroad currently capable of handling 80 mph intermodal trains and 110 mph passenger trains (with a few revisions in the rules, which is cheaper than revising the signalling) west from Chicago toward Cedar Rapids and Omaha. Now comes a story out of California (via Destination: Freedom) in which Union Pacific objects to sharing its right of way with California's bullet trains.

In the April 23 letter, officials of Omaha-based Union Pacific reportedly said the high-speed passenger trains would interfere with their freight business and could lead to unsafe conditions. They also said they would resist efforts by the state to obtain the land through power of eminent domain.

Union Pacific's problem might be that there will be a track running along its right of way that its freight trains can't use. The carrier has been cooperative with Passenger Rail authorities that are willing to build additional tracks for them, and sometimes those additional tracks lead to improved on-time performance for passenger trains. But it took some wrangling between Union Pacific and Metra until the carrier stopped treating the third main to Elburn as additional capacity to hold freight trains out of the yard. Now imagine a track or two dedicated to fast passenger trains with no connecting crossovers. The anxiety level is already rising in Omaha.