DON'T GET YOUR HOPES UP.

A Northern Star editorial suggests an extension of Chicago's Metra to DeKalb would benefit many students.

These statistics mean the Metra line extending into DeKalb could serve a total of 61% of in-state students, regardless of whether they commute or live on and around campus.

The line’s extension could mean worthwhile accessibility to Chicago for students living in the DeKalb area, whether for entertainment or for ease of travel home to visit family and friends.

That editorial also quotes Greg Sparrow, who served as mayor in 1990, who noted, "To date, I don’t envision that we are going to get anything done."

No, the topic has been under consideration for as long as I have lived here, and experience speaks.

A sad prediction: the study will turn up some small benefit to the trains, but the necessary taxing district will come a cropper in the rest of the county.  "When I hired out at Northern Illinois University, local thinking was that the Metra commuter train would be coming to DeKalb sometime in the next ten years."  So it was in 2019, so it was in 2010, so it might always be.  Never mind that Genoa and Belvidere fight over the scraps that might be available for Amtrak service returning to Rockford.

I'll have something to write about, if nothing else.

Of late, keeping the existing Amtrak trains running has been a challenge.  Maybe the current president could ask the people who arranged a special movement from somewhere in Poland into Ukraine and return how it's done.