Double Track Northwest Indiana, and what it changed for South Bend

2022–2024 · THE SECOND TRACK

The biggest investment in the South Shore's history was made in Lake and Porter counties, and its South Bend effect must be stated exactly: The Double Track Northwest Indiana project built a second track between Gary and Michigan City — 16.9 miles of new double track within a twenty-six-mile segment — eliminated twenty-one grade crossings, and in Michigan City lifted the trains off Tenth and Eleventh Streets, where they had run down the roadway since the line's first years, onto a dedicated alignment; the street running there ended in 2022. The budget was $650 million; the as-built figure is reported at about $600 million, and Railway Age gives $649 million. Construction began in 2022 — Railway Age dates the start to 2021, and the division is printed rather than reconciled — the ribbon was cut on 13 May 2024, and the new schedules took effect on 14 May 2024 with fourteen added weekday trains, fifty-three in total, including new limited-stop expresses. System ridership at the ribbon-cutting was running at about fifty percent of its pre-pandemic level. The South Bend effect is this, and no more: the project laid no rail east of Michigan City. From Michigan City to South Bend the line remains what it has been — single track with passing sidings. What South Bend got was time and trains. The Gary–Michigan City bottleneck and the Michigan City street running had taxed every South Bend schedule for a century; with both gone, the limited-stop express between South Bend and Chicago was carded at one hour forty-nine minutes — better than Insull's best of one hour fifty in 1933 — and Michigan City–Chicago fell to sixty-seven minutes. The improvement is real and it is a schedule improvement, purchased with other counties' concrete.

Sources:

1. NICTD and Herzog's Double Track project record, and Railway Track and Structures' completion account (May 2024) — the Gary–Michigan City second track, 16.9 miles of double track in a twenty-six-mile segment, twenty-one crossings eliminated, the Michigan City street running's removal, construction from 2022, the ribbon of 13 May 2024 and the schedules of 14 May 2024 with fourteen added weekday trains and the one-hour-forty-nine-minute South Bend express.
2. WNDU, May 2024 — the $650 million budget against about $600 million as built, and system ridership at about fifty percent of pre-pandemic levels at the ribbon-cutting.
3. Railway Age