Lincoln Service


The Lincoln Service is a 284-mile higher-speed rail service operated by Amtrak that runs between Chicago, Illinois and St. Louis, Missouri. The train is a part of the Illinois Service and is partially funded by the Illinois Department of Transportation. The train uses the same tracks as the long-distance Texas Eagle.
The Lincoln Service is a re-branding of the former State House route, which had run between Chicago and St. Louis since 1973. Originally intended to connect Chicago and Springfield, Amtrak extended the train to St. Louis at its own expense because the Springfield station was not designed to turn equipment.
It runs along a route previously owned by the Alton Railroad, which merged with the Gulf, Mobile and Ohio Railroad in 1947. By the time the GM&O merged with the Illinois Central Railroad in 1972, Amtrak had taken over passenger service.
During fiscal year 2016, the Lincoln Service trains carried 548,955 passengers, a decrease of 4.8% from FY2015. The service had a total revenue of $14,266,964, a decrease of 1.3% from FY2015.
, the travel time from Chicago to St. Louis was 5 hours 30 minutes -- 35 minutes slower than the
Illinois Central Railroad operated its express trains over the same route during the 1930s.

Upgrades

As a result of continuing upgrades on the line between Chicago and St. Louis, the State House was rebranded as the Lincoln Service on October 30, 2006, with two additional round trips. This resulted in the Chicago-St. Louis corridor being served by five daily round trips, including the Texas Eagle and Ann Rutledge which terminated beyond St. Louis. From April 2007 the Ann Rutledge operated only between Kansas City and St. Louis where it connected once daily to the Lincoln Service. The Ann Rutledge was folded into the Missouri River Runner in 2009; one Lincoln Service round trip per day still connects with the Missouri River Runner.
In July 2010, the state of Illinois and the Union Pacific Railroad reached an agreement under which track speeds between Dwight and Alton, Illinois were to be raised to as high as. This speed will cut the travel time between Chicago and St. Louis by 90 minutes, bringing the trip to under four hours. The first track upgrade construction was planned to be between Alton and Lincoln, Illinois and was projected to cost $98 million. The construction on this stretch began on September 17, 2010 in Alton and was completed in 2011. Most of the funding came from $1.1 billion in stimulus money for Illinois high-speed rail from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The remainder of this grant, as well as $400 million in funding from the state of Illinois, was used to complete a high-speed rail corridor for the remaining portions of the St. Louis–Chicago track. Senator Dick Durbin suggested the Dwight–Alton upgrades would create some 900 jobs, while the overall project could generate 24,000.
On March 22, 2011, an announcement was made in Chicago that an additional $685 million would be used to upgrade trackage and grade crossings between Dwight and Lincoln. Construction on the improvement project began on April 5, 2011.
Although much of track upgrade work was completed between 2010 and 2012, there are additional constructions including second trackage, bridge replacement and rehabilitation, drainage improvements, and grade crossings and signal improvements before the full service can be fully operated on this route. After all required improvements on the first segment between Dwight and Pontiac, Illinois were completed, Amtrak started the higher-speed rail service with top speeds of on that segment in November 2012, with the entire section between Alton and Joliet expected to have operation by 2017.
The slowest portion of the corridor is the segment between Chicago and Joliet, but improving this would require an additional $1.5 billion investment. Two projects proposed from the Chicago Region Environmental and Transportation Efficiency Program would remove two diamond crossings and construct an overpass to increase train speed and eliminate delays. One project is in the preliminary design phase while the proposed flyover at Brighton Park crossing is unfunded.

Train

A Lincoln Service train consists of the following:

Route and station stops

The Metra Heritage Corridor commuter line uses the same route from Joliet to Union Station.
StateTown/CityStationConnections
IllinoisChicagoChicago Union Station Amtrak: Blue Water, Capitol Limited, Cardinal, California Zephyr, Carl Sandburg, City of New Orleans, Empire Builder, Hiawatha Service, Hoosier State, Illini, Illinois Zephyr, Lake Shore Limited, Pere Marquette, Saluki, Southwest Chief, Texas Eagle, Wolverine, Thruway Motorcoach
CTA Buses: 1, 7, 14, 19, 20, X20, X28, 56, 60, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 128, 129, 130, 151, 156, 157, 192
Megabus: M1, M2, M3, M4, M5, M6, M7
Metra: North Central Service, Milwaukee District/North Line, Milwaukee District/West Line, BNSF Railway Line, Heritage Corridor, SouthWest Service
IllinoisSummitSummit Amtrak station Metra: Heritage Corridor
Pace: 330
IllinoisJolietJoliet Transportation Center Amtrak: Texas Eagle
Metra: Heritage Corridor, Rock Island District Line
Pace: 501, 504, 505, 507, 508, 509, 511, 832, 834
IllinoisDwightDwight Amtrak station none
IllinoisPontiacPontiac Amtrak station Amtrak: Texas Eagle
IllinoisNormalBloomington-Normal station Amtrak: Texas Eagle
Burlington Trailways: Indianapolis, IN - Burlington
BNPTS: E, H
IllinoisLincolnLincoln Amtrak station Amtrak: Texas Eagle
IllinoisSpringfieldSpringfield Amtrak station Amtrak: Texas Eagle
SMTD
IllinoisCarlinvilleCarlinville Amtrak station Amtrak: Texas Eagle
IllinoisAltonAlton Amtrak station Amtrak: Texas Eagle
Madison County Transit: Route 11
MissouriSt. LouisGateway Multimodal Transportation Center Amtrak: Missouri River Runner, Texas Eagle, Thruway Motorcoach
MetroLink: Red Line and Blue Line
MetroBus: 4, 8, 10, 11, 32, 74, 80, 94, 99, 36X, 40X, 58X, 410X, 174X
Madison County Transit: 1X, 3X, 12X, 14X, 16X, 18X
Greyhound Lines
Burlington Trailways
Megabus'

One Lincoln Service round trip per day connects with the St. Louis-Kansas City Missouri River Runner, providing through service between Chicago and Kansas City. Additionally, one westbound Lincoln Service'' runs express to St. Louis via Joliet, Bloomington-Normal, Springfield and Alton.