of conduct for public meetings 2023 to 2027 pursuant to rule 58 of the chicago city council
rules of order and procedure the sergeant at arms sets forth the following rules of conduct for
members of the public these rules shall be in effect at all times that a viewing gallery or
room is open for a meeting of the city council or any of its committees all individuals and
their belongings are subject to search at entry or upon request individuals must remain seated at
all times except one when entering or exiting the gallery two when providing public comment
during the portion of a meeting set aside for that purpose or three when asked to rise and
be acknowledged by a member of the city council profane threatening harassing abusive or defamatory
behavior or speech, which in the judgment of the meeting's chair or the sergeant-at-arms may lead
to a breach of the peace or disrupt the orderly conduct of the meeting, is not permitted.
Disruptive or distracting actions, such as the stomping of feet, waving of arms, throwing any
item, whistling, booing, shouting, or other loud utterances, are not permitted when in the judgment
of the meeting's chair, or the sergeant-at-arms, such actions are disrupting or impeding the
orderly conduct of the meeting. Any item that poses a potential safety hazards, as determined
by the sergeant-at-arms, is prohibited in the gallery. Such items include, but are not limited
to, 1. Any pointed objects, including knives of any kind. 2. Banners, flyers, or other forms of
signage. 3. Food and beverages, including in glass or metal canisters. 4. Backpacks, large bags,
and sealed packages. Clear bags, not tinted in color, that do not exceed 12 inches by 6 inches
by 12, are permitted and subject to search. And 5. Firearms, ammunition, fireworks, laser pointers,
stun guns, tasers, mace pepper spray, and toy weapons. Cell phones and other small handheld
recording devices must be placed in silent mode, can only be used while seated, and can only be
used in a manner that does not interfere with the ability other individuals to view or hear the
proceedings. Individuals or groups failing to adhere to these rules will be subject to removal
from the remainder of the meeting by the Sergeant-at-Arms.
City of Chicago, City Council, Rules of Conduct for Public Meetings, 2023-2027
Pursuant to Rule 58 of the Chicago City Council Rules of Order and Procedure,
the Sergeant-at-Arms sets forth the following rules of conduct for members of the public.
These rules shall be in effect at all times that a viewing gallery or room is open for a meeting of the City Council or any of its committees.
All individuals and their belongings are subject to search at entry or upon request.
Individuals must remain seated at all times except, one, when entering or exiting the gallery, two, when providing public comment during the portion of a meeting, set aside for that purpose, or three, when asked to rise and be acknowledged by a member of the City Council.
profane, threatening, harassing, abusive, or defamatory behavior, or speech,
which in the judgment of the meeting's chair, or the
Good morning, everyone. The Committee on Transportation and Public Way is now called to order. We will now have a roll call to establish a quorum. Will the aldermen please make sure their microphones are unmuted. Please note that your yes or present response will be deemed to be a yes vote when this quorum roll call is used as reference vote for later items. Thank you.
Chairman Mitchell, present.
Alderman Conway.
Alderman Irving.
Vice Chair Vasquez.
Alderman Fuentes.
Alderman Gutierrez.
Alderman Harris.
Alderman Hopkins.
Alderman Moore.
Alderman Nugent.
Alderman Rodriguez.
Alderman Yancey.
Alderman Irving.
Alderman Mosley.
Alderman Gutierrez.
There are 11 members present
We have a quorum
I understand
At this time we will begin the public comment period
Out of respect for everybody's time
Public comment will be limited to 30 minutes
And each speaker is normally limited to 3 minutes
But I'm going to shorten the time for 2 minutes
To allow for more individuals to have an opportunity to speak
Speakers
In accordance with Rule 58 of the City Council Rules of Order, please refrain from profane language, obscene conduct, or disruptive comments.
Our first public speaker will be John Daly.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of this committee and the entire audience.
I stand here as an individual resident of the 11th Ward County Commissioner to say that on the resolution that Alderman Nicole Lee has presented, I urge support of this.
This is a resolution.
Let me make it very clear.
The first time I walked into this room was 1955 when my dad was elected, sworn in as mayor of the city of Chicago.
A mayor, an individual who was very pro-labor.
My entire family, including my brother Rich, myself, the electeds from our community,
and the electeds before me have been extremely pro-union.
This is not our opposition to Amtrak.
It's not against the unions.
In the Illinois House and the Illinois Senate, I supported the new building at a guaranteed rate.
This is a building that is in great condition.
But the present site, the Amtrak maintenance facility, is a facility that no one would want in their backyard.
At the meeting that was held at the Carpenters Union, I asked members of Amtrak, who was on the panel,
and let me say, Amtrak does a great job in the sense of improving conditions throughout the city.
And this amount of money should not be spent on a maintenance facility.
It is wrong.
It is wrong in the Chinatown, Bridgeport, Armory Square, Wentworth Gardens, and it is wrong in any community.
I thank you for your support from the community and throughout the city.
And I urge the electeds, not only in this room, to ask themselves, and to Nicole Lee, this is an issue that affects her community and her board.
If it was your board, you would not want this in your community as well.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Commissioner.
Our next speaker is Maria Lagriglio.
You already know our concerns about pollution, noise, vibration, traffic, and safety.
So with my limited time, I want to drive home a few things.
First, look at the process.
The site was selected.
Federal funding was pursued.
The FRA issued categorical exclusions, plans advanced for years.
Only then were the thousands of people living beside this location told it was coming on August 20th.
What meaningful role was the public supposed to have after those discussions had already been made?
Second, show us the environmental record.
Amtrak says its studies demonstrate no significant environmental impacts,
yet residents still have not received the complete underlying studies.
You cannot ask us to trust that a massive 24-hour industrial operations beside our home is safe
while withholding the evidence you rely upon to say so.
Release the studies, all of them.
Third, Amtrak's comparison to the old Canal Street rail yard is wrong.
Union Pacific shut down its container operation there in 2019.
They wound down for years before that.
What Amtrak proposes is not simply a continuation of current conditions.
It is the re-industrialization of this corridor and those neighborhoods.
A rail line is not the same thing as a massive 24-7 maintenance, fueling, and servicing complex.
And Amtrak's current maintenance operation sits in an industrial area for a reason.
Its history includes spills, fires, and hazardous material responses, including a 2,800-gallon diesel spill in 2019 and a 2024 fire and oil spill.
Now they want to move these functions directly besides homes, parks, and schools.
Location matters.
We oppose this location.
Chicago is a city with enormous rail infrastructure.
Convenient for Amtrak does not mean convenient for the city of Chicago.
Look at how this project has changed.
Why are working-class Chicago neighborhoods being asked to absorb the consequences of clearing enormously valuable South Loop land for Justin Ishbia and his family for a private development transaction at our expense?
Modernize Amtrak. Don't reorganize the near-south side around a private real estate deal.
Finally, this project is not inevitable. Threats of federal preemption should not become next.
Our next speaker is Hannah Dombowski.
Dombowski.
Good morning. My name is Hannah Domboski. I'm the founder and co-lead of Bridgeport
Environmentalists. Rail yards are known polluting facilities. Diesel fumes from trains cause health
harms such as asthma, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and premature death. The US EPA states
that living near a rail yard increases the risk of these severe harms. And on top of air pollution,
rail yards also create risks of toxic spills, contaminated runoff, and more. Moving this
facility puts all these hazards in a dense residential community. There are 6,741 people
living within 500 feet of the proposed site, as opposed to 29 that close to the current site.
This proposal has received a categorical exclusion from environmental review from the
Trump administration, which Amtrak is using to claim there will be no significant environmental
impacts. However, the White House has published a categorical exclusion first approach as part of
the administration's efforts to gut environmental regulations. We cannot rely on the Trump
administration to judge how this facility will impact thousands of people. I want to clarify that
we're not against rail. We're environmentalists. However, we do think relocating a rail yard is not
worth sacrificing the health of thousands of people, and we are not convinced this would be
better for Amtrak than fixing their current yard. Many experts have expressed serious concerns that
moving the rail yard to Canal Street would actually be worse for Amtrak given issues like
the increased distance from Union Station and the pinch point at the bridge over the south branch of
the Chicago River. We are deeply concerned that the true reason for this project is the planned
land swap for the White Sox Stadium, orchestrated by private equity billionaire Justin Ishbia,
who created Canal Edge to execute and expedite this rail yard project. Did everyone see the
news yesterday that Ishbia just bought the massive shopping center adjacent to Amtrak's
current rail yard? No community deserves to be sacrificed, and that is exactly what this
proposed rail yard move does, sacrifice our community. We deserve transparency, an environmental
impact statement and protections from a facility that carries such extensive environmental and
health risks. Thank you. Our next speaker is Anne F. Caruso. Good morning. Follow this if you can.
Amtrak secured a $696 million federal grant. The FRA is bound by federal historic and
environmental laws. Our residents have a statutory right to demand a seat at the table
under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act. We request to be a consulting
party. Through Canal Edge, ISPIA's private investment of $125 million will go toward
the overall relocation and stadium campus planning.
Ishbia is also requesting a federal loan of $1.8 billion
by his development entity, City River Holdings,
through the Railroad Rehabilitation and Improvement Financing Program,
a low-interest loan.
This loan will fund the transformation of Amtrak's 14th Street rail yard.
Ishbia's private equity firm, Shore Capital Partners,
is under contract to purchase the 47-acre riverfront parcel.
Canal Edge LLC, owned by Justin Ishbia, is under contract to lead the development, financing, and construction.
This dominated, the dominated link here, for the rail yards to exist, Amtrak must vacate its current 14th Street location.
Land swap agreement, public-private partnership.
Once Canal Edge Ishbia's company delivers the footprint, the Canal Edge place the 47-acre parcel under contract occupied by Amtrak, the BNSF expansion.
This deal also involves a parallel agreement to purchase an adjacent 20-acre lot.
This will expand Ishbia's continuous control of the land from West Roosevelt Road to West 18th Street.
The key words here, ladies and gentlemen, Justin Ishbia.
Amtrak can stay on 14th Street when Ishbia waves the white flag.
Ishbia, you're not getting Bridgeport, Chinatown, or Armour Square.
Our next speaker is Ty Nguyen.
I apologize, sir.
Go ahead.
No worries.
What's the correct person name?
Ty Nguyen.
Oh, I really missed it.
Okay, thank you.
I'm sorry.
My name is Tina Nguyen, and I'm the Vice President of Impact and Advocacy with the Chinese-American Service League, or CASEL.
Thank you for the opportunity to comment today and all the women of COLE for introducing this resolution opposing the proposed Amtrak Midwest Maintenance Facility.
CASEL serves over 7,400 people across Chicago, and most of our clients live in Bridgeport, Chinatown, Armor Square, and the surrounding neighborhoods, mostly directly impacted by this project.
Our own client data shows that nearly 3,000 CASEL clients live within a half mile of the proposed site.
These are families, children, and seniors who would be directly impacted by the 24-7 rail maintenance operations near their homes.
CASEL members have attended multiple public events to learn more about this Amtrak project.
But each time, we have been disappointed by Amtrak's leadership's responses.
Amstrak has not been able to clearly answer questions about the facility's potential environmental impacts on surrounding neighborhoods or explain how they plan to address noise concerns.
We understand that trains need regular maintenance and public transit is an important mode of transportation in and out of the city.
However, the way this project was introduced and presented to the community has not been collaborative or transparent.
That's why CASA supports this resolution and calls on the city to convene another public meeting on Amtrak's site selection process, environmental review, and the possible effects on nearby communities.
We as community residents deserve to see that information.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next speaker is Andrea Kluger.
Good morning.
Thank you, Chair Mitchell and members of the committee.
My name is Andrea Kluger.
I'm Chief of Staff at the Chicago Federation of Labor.
We represent 300 unions and 500,000 working people in Chicago and Cook County.
I'm here today regarding the resolution in opposition to Amtrak's proposed Midwest maintenance facility at the Canal Street Yard.
The CFL recognizes and respects that this resolution is primarily intended to give voice to concerns raised by residents surrounding the facility.
We believe those concerns about noise, emission, nighttime operations, and environmental conditions deserve continued engagement from Amtrak.
We also believe it's important for the Council to hear the perspective of the workers who maintain and build Chicago's passenger rail system and would benefit directly by this project.
Chicago is the center of the nation's passenger rail system, but Amtrak's existing maintenance facilities are aging, undersized, and fragmented.
Workers labor outdoors and must make multiple inefficient movements to inspect, repair, clean, and prepare trains for service.
They deserve modern, safe, and an efficient workplace.
The proposed facility at the Canal Street Yard would consolidate the facility and would streamline and modernize the maintenance inspection work,
allowing approximately 400 mechanics, electricians, and other skilled rail workers to labor in an indoor facility
because this operation supports 16 Amtrak routes and more than a half of the nation's long-distance trains,
these improvements would also help reduce delays and improve reliability for passengers across the region and the country.
The project would also create approximately 3,000 construction jobs.
The federal government has also committed nearly $600 million to building this facility in Chicago,
giving the city's financial challenges and substantial infrastructure needs.
this represents an important opportunity to bring federal investment and thousands of good
union jobs to Chicago while strengthening our regional transportation system. As this proceeds
through federal review and approval, we hope today's hearing can contribute to ongoing conversation
about how to address community concerns while ensuring the project's transportation and economic
benefits are considered. All right. All right. All right. Guys, I'm giving everybody an opportunity
to speak today. So work with me on
this. All right. My next speaker is Wesley
Taver. Tanver.
Tanner. Good morning. My name is Wesley Tanner. I'm a
machinist technician with Amtrak. My job is to inspect
and repair the equipment that keeps our trains safe and ready for service.
A lot of this work is currently done outside.
In Chicago, that means working through extreme cold, snow, rain, wind, and summer heat.
We get the job done, but those conditions can make technical work more difficult and time-consuming than it needs to be.
A modern facility would allow us to perform more maintenance indoors in a safer and more consistent environment.
It would help us complete inspections and repairs more efficiently and keep reliable equipment available for our passengers.
For me, this project is about giving employees the right work environment and tools to do quality work every day.
Appreciate your time.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next speaker is Kathleen Hughes.
Kathleen Hughes.
Hello, everybody.
Thank you for this hearing today.
Chicago is a railroad town.
Chicago is also an industrial city.
We have enormous industrial corridors, freight corridors, rail yards, manufacturing districts, and transportation infrastructure throughout the city.
Heavy industrial facilities belong in places designed and planned to accommodate them.
Yeah, wouldn't that come, Amy?
And we already know what happens when we get that wrong.
Look at Pilsen with Sims Metal.
Look at McKinley Park and Matt Asphalt.
Look at communities across the south and southwest sides that have spent years fighting industrial pollution pushed up against our homes, our schools, and our parks.
Many of these neighborhoods are already surrounded by highways, freight, traffic, rail infrastructure, and other sources of pollution.
So why in 2026 would we knowingly create another version of that problem?
Amtrak already operates its maintenance facility in a heavily industrial area.
I have stood on the 18th Street Bridge and looked down, as have many of you, at it with my own eyes.
There are industrial buildings.
Diesel tanks, 500,000-gallon diesel tanks, which I'm sure nobody wants across the street from their house,
and heavy industry as far as you can see.
There are no houses immediately beside that operation.
Then go to 33rd and Canal.
There are homes.
There are families.
There is Armour Square Park.
There are schools.
People will be living roughly 100 feet from an industrial rail maintenance operation running 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
We do not need to speculate about whether putting heavy industry beside residential neighborhoods is good planning.
Chicago has already run that experiment.
We should have learned from it.
Our next speaker is Arturo Alvarez, followed by Antonio Cirillo.
Good morning.
My name is Mr. Alvarez.
I'm Local 484 President of the Sheet Metal Plumbers and Pipe Fitters.
Shoppers, can you speak up into the mics?
My work requires attention to detail because of the system of maintenance that repair carefully and correctly.
A lot of the work is currently performed outdoors.
We all know this.
Chicago weather is jacked up.
It's bipolar, right?
We don't know.
But the conditions, if we get new facilities, we can work indoors safely, slip resistance.
nobody will get hurt as much.
Let me talk.
Let me talk.
Go ahead, Mr. Alvarez.
In a modern climate,
control facility would allow us to focus on
the work instead of the detail
on the snow, the ice, the rain,
the heat, and the wind.
And improve
the repairs on our trains.
You know, that way everybody can
ride the train safely
and not worry about all that.
The employees' maintenance
and the equipment on the passenger depend on us. Thank you. Antonio Cirillo, followed by Anita
Ponder. Yes, good morning. My name is Antonio Cirillo. I'm a foreman too at Amtrak. I help
coordinate the employees' responsibility for inspecting, servicing, and preparing equipment
for passenger service. I see the first hand that the conditions in the workplace affect safety,
productivity, and our ability to return equipment to service on time. At our current yard, Amtrak
employees work outside in Chicago's weather. They continue to get the job done, but these conditions
make the work more challenging and make it hard to recruit and retain skilled employees. A modern
indoor facility will provide a safer, more organized, more effective workplace. It would help
our team maintain equipment and support a reliability passenger service. Our employees
take pride in their work. The facility would give them a workplace that better supports
the important job they do every day. Thank you.
Is Anita Ponder in?
Anita Ponder? All right.
Amy Sitner and her identical
twin, Megan Rupp, followed by Tina
Harris. Good morning. Good morning.
My name is Amy Sitner, and this is my twin sister, Megan Rupp.
We are proud Chicago public school teachers and also union members.
As city employees, we are required to live in Chicago.
So we poured our savings into building our homes from the ground up side by side in Bridgeport, with our property line sitting right against these tracks.
When we built our homes, this was not an active industrial maintenance yard.
Converting standard transit tracks into 24-7 heavy industrial rail yard doesn't just change our neighborhood.
It drastically threatens our health and our quality of life.
Unlike other union workers who support this project and drive home to the suburbs,
we are required to live in this city because we are CPS teachers.
And we have to sleep and live here and breathe this air every single day.
Industrial maintenance yards don't belong against residential homes.
Thank you.
So Tina, Tina, Lori Harris, followed by Ray.
Legal, like. Oh, wow.
So. Tina Harris.
Okay, Ray Lau. Ray Lau, followed by Zoe Ma.
Good morning, y'all. Good morning, y'all. My name is Ray Lau. I live on Bridgeport. I'm a planning graduate student at UIC. I believe that – sorry. To clarify, I do believe that passenger mails to Chicago, and I support it. But where in-house Amtrak maintains its trains should be decided with the people that live next door.
I have mapped Amtrak's own documents against public data. About 22,000 people live within a quarter mile of this yard.
The city's own environmental justice index ranks every census tract around that yard in the 90th to the 84th percentile for citywide diesel pollution.
Amtrak's own site plans show a maintenance facility that they want to build that is about 120, 1200 feet in length that already sits 15 feet above the street.
The current site is on a larger plot of land.
It's also outside, which I rebuke because you can still build an indoor facility on the current plot of land, and it will be larger.
I'm asking this committee to press Amtrak for four things.
Release the full noise, air quality, and traffic studies, data, methodology, not just the summary.
Make the fixed noise a binding commitment.
Explain the land for its main entrance at 35th Street, which isn't owned by them yet.
There's property lines and a whole public meetings because there's only been two public meetings so far.
And we still have not gotten any environmental feedback or any of the published documents.
Thank you.
Zoe Ma followed by Bob Guy.
My name is Zoe Ma.
I'm an independent progressive candidate for mayor of Chicago and a real estate professional with 25 years of experience.
I opposed Amitrex's proposed relocation of maintenance operation into residential area of Chinatown and Bridgeport.
Before this project proceed, residents deserve answers about diesel emission, noise, vibration, traffic, and potential contamination.
They deserve an independent environmental review and enforceable protections.
As a real estate professional, I know that incompatible industrial development can damage neighborhood stability and put pressure on families to leave.
I call on the mayor and this council to hold city approval until these concerns are fully addressed.
Chicago should establish citywide zoning protections against industrial facilities that pose substantial environmental impact to nearby residential communities.
Whether in South Shore, Chinatown, Bridgeport, development must protect the people who already live there.
We can support passenger rail without sacrificing residential neighborhoods.
Put people before profits.
Protect our health, our home, our future.
Thank you.
Bob Guy, followed by Dan Wexler.
Good morning, Chair Mitchell and members of the committee.
My name is Bob Guy.
I serve as state legislative director in Illinois for Smart Transportation Division.
On behalf of the nearly 10,000 active and retired members in Illinois, our members are mainly conductors,
but operating crew members in freight, metra, and, of course, Amtrak,
I'd like to convey our years-long support for the new Amtrak Midwest Maintenance Facility.
My members operate these services.
Our members, the men and women of Smart TD, operate these rail services every day,
and they certainly understand how important safe, clean, and reliable service is for the traveling public.
When service is reliable, it benefits both our customers.
and the rail employees who deliver that service, especially our members.
This investment will improve working conditions, support good jobs,
help ensure the equipment our passengers rely on is properly maintained and ready for service.
The current Amtrak facility has simply met its useful life.
As passenger rail continues to grow, we must invest in the facilities and workers that keep it moving.
Chicago cannot remain the center of Midwest passenger rail without modern infrastructure
that supports safe and reliable service.
On behalf of the Smart Transportation Division, the men and women, our members,
that operate the services every day, these trains in and out of Chicago every day,
the very successful service, by the way,
I respectfully urge the committee to support this important investment in our workers,
our passengers, and the future of Chicago.
Thank you for your time.
So so Dan Wexler, Wexler, followed by Jody Fraylor, Fraley, Fraley.
Good morning. My name is Dan Wexler and I'm a policy analyst for the Indiana, Illinois, Iowa Foundation for Fair Contracting.
I'm here today to speak in support of the Amtrak maintenance facility.
Thank you. Thank you, chair and members of the committee for holding this hearing and for your time.
Part of the IIIFFC's work is market analysis, studying the public construction market across Illinois, Indiana, and Iowa
to understand where investment is going and what it delivers for workers, contractors, and taxpayers.
Through that lens, the Amtrak Midwest Maintenance Facility stands as one of the most significant transportation investments on the table for Chicago.
Start with the scale.
This is a $900 million project.
The federal government has committed more than $600 million of that, and at a time when the city faces serious budget pressure and enormous infrastructure needs, an investment of this size, largely funded from outside city coffers, is an opportunity Chicago cannot afford to lose to another region.
Then look at the jobs.
The project is expected to create approximately 3,000 construction jobs and around 400 permanent rail jobs.
Construction dollars do not stay on the job site.
Workers spend their paychecks at local shops, restaurants, and businesses,
and contractors buy materials and services from local suppliers.
That activity ripples across the 11th Ward, the southwest side, and the entire city.
Finally, consider what this project protects.
Chicago is the hub of the nation's passenger rail system.
Maintenance here supports 16 Amtrak rails and more than half of all long-distance trains in the country.
But the current facility near 14th Street was not built for today's needs.
with short tracks, constrained geometry, and limited sight lines.
A modern facility straightens Chicago's role as the place where America's rail network comes together
and the improvements to nearby bridges and viaducts benefit the whole community.
To get the full value from this investment, we encourage the project to move forward.
High road contractors that pay prevailing wage deliver better work, fewer delays, and better outcomes for taxpayers.
We ask the committee to support moving forward with this project.
So Jody, Jody Fraley, as followed by Sammy Moy.
Good morning.
My name is Jody Fraley.
I'm with the IIIFFC.
We, our organization was founded over 25 years ago to promote and advocate for fair contracting
and public works construction.
This $900 million investment is, at its core, a massive win for working families.
We are talking about 3,000 union-caliber construction jobs where the next generation of Chicago's workforce will earn what they learn, working safely along experienced journey workers.
But this isn't just about temporary work.
Once built, this facility secures 400 permanent, family-sustaining careers for skilled rail workers.
Even more critically, it finally replaces the outdated 14th Street Yard, a hazardous facility where cramped tracks and poor sight lines put our workers at risk every single day.
Our workers deserve a workplace that protects their lives and dignity.
This modern facility delivers the safe environment that they have long earned.
With $600 billion in federal funding locked in, Amtrak has a profound obligation to turn public dollars into lasting careers.
We demand that they hire responsible contractors who honor registered apprentices and build clear, equitable pathways for local Chicago residents.
We urge the committee here today to greenlight this project under a strong framework of labor responsibility.
Let's build a stronger, safer future for Chicago's working class.
Thank you for your time.
Sammy Moy, followed by Abraham Matthew.
Good morning.
I'm Sammy Moy, and I'm going to live half a block directly facing this maintenance facility.
Every morning when I go outside, I see trees lying in the street,
right field, where the White Sox play in open space.
This open space is a White Sox parking lot.
Besides Sox parking, people in the community use this lot for exercising, jogging,
walking their dogs, and kids riding their bikes.
If the Amtrak maintenance facility is built,
I will be looking at a monstrous facility five-story high and at least two blocks long.
Hmm. Also, based on Amtrak's rendering, this open space will become an industrial site with waste retention tanks, fuel tanks, oil and grease tanks, a sanitary service station, trash and recycling facility, which will attract rats.
This is not what I want for my children and my grandchildren.
To give you an idea of how the noise are, a lawnmower is 85 decibels. One idling train is 75 decibels. There will not be one idling train at this maintenance facility. There will be multiple trains idling, trains actively running back and forth on the tracks, and trains blaring their horns. This will be louder and give more diesel fumes than a lawnmower.
All the noise and diesel fumes from the trains will be running 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
The Amtrak maintenance facility does not belong in a dense residential area.
This kind of facility will destroy communities and harm people's health.
Council members, please do not allow this Amtrak facility to be built in our community.
Thank you.
Support you.
You're working the same fire bed.
Mr. Moy. Oh. Oh, you go in.
Not once. You guys talk about the health of the people that live there.
Do you support us and worry about our health? Abraham Matthew
followed by Geraldo Mender. All right.
So, Abraham Matthew. Okay. Geraldo Mender
followed by Michael Lingle. Good morning. My name is
Gerardo Mendez. I am a construction analyst for the Indiana-Illinois-Iowa Foundation for Fair
Contracting. We are a non-for-profit labor management organization which advocates responsible
bidders in our public works project. I am here in support of the Amtrak Maintenance Facility
Project. So the Amtrak Maintenance Facility Project is a strong project. The project means
it is good union jobs. Millions of investments into the project and the infrastructure for the
rail. It's $6 million of federal funding, as well as creating 3,000 construction jobs.
It reinforces Chicago as the hub of a national passage rail, as well as making it a majority
of economic investments. The replacement of an outdated facility to a modern one will
improve safety and reliability. When the facility is finished, it will support 400 permanent railroad
jobs. That's 400 families that will be here and spending money in Chicago. This will make
Chicago a strong national rail yard and transportation hub. It brings good jobs,
outside investment, and modern facilities that keep Chicago as the heart of the national rail
system. I hope that the committee will support moving forward. Thank you
for your consideration.
Michael Lingo, followed by Thomas Haley.
All right.
Good morning. My name is Michael Lingle. I'm the field operations coordinator for the IIFFC. We're a fair contracting organization.
Good morning, Chair Mitchell and members of the conference council.
You know, one of the aspects that we promote over and over and over again with public construction projects is apprenticeship.
It's the path forward for the next generation of skilled trades.
And this project and the federal funding that comes with it promotes a tremendous opportunity to include apprenticeship in the construction and build the next generation of workers.
If you've seen any of the projections, the skilled trades are in dire need going forward, and we need opportunities for skilled workers on projects like this.
So that's what we are here to promote today, and hope you consider that in your endeavors.
Thank you.
Thomas Haley, followed by Marina Tahira.
Hello, my name is Thomas Haley, and I'm a construction analyst for the Indiana, Illinois, Iowa for Foundation of Fair Contracting.
And I'm here to speak in support of the Amtrak Maintenance Facility.
Thank you, Chair Mitchell and the members for having us here today and for your time.
As a construction analyst, I spend my days on public construction sites across northern Illinois.
Our job at the IIFFC is to monitor projects and make sure workers are classified correctly,
paid what the law requires, and work on sites that follow federal, state, and local rules.
I've seen that separates a good project from a bad one, and it usually comes down to the standards set at the start.
That's why I want to talk about 3,000 construction jobs this project is expected to create.
3,000 jobs is a big number, but the real value is what kind of jobs they are.
When the federal project like this is built by responsible contractors under prevailing wage standards, those jobs come with fair pay, health care, retirement, and safety training.
They are careers that let people stay, support a family, and stay in the city of Chicago.
That is the kind of work this $900 million project can deliver.
The benefits do not end when the construction does.
This new facility would support around 400 permanent rail jobs, replacing an outdated facility near 14th Street that has short tracks, constrained geometry, and limited sight lines.
A modern facility means a safer workplace for the people who keep Amtrak trains running.
Those trains matter to the whole country.
Chicago is a hub of the nation's passenger rail network.
And maintenance here supports 16 Amtrak routes and more than half of all long-distance trains.
Investing in this facility keeps that work and those jobs in our city.
With more than $600 million in federal funding committed, there is a clear responsibility to make sure every dollar is spent well.
We encourage the city and Amtrak to require responsible bidding, prevailing wage compliance, and real accountability on those job sites.
Those standards protect workers, protect honest contractors, and protect taxpayers.
We also recognize residents have asked for more information about the project, and we support Amtrak being transparent with the community.
We urge you to help this project move forward responsibly and hold it to highest standards.
Thank you, Chair Mitchell.
Marina Tahira.
Marina Tahira.
Hey, excuse me, excuse me, guys.
Marina Tahira, followed by George Blakemore.
Good morning, everybody.
My name is Marina Tahira.
I'm a recent student or graduate of UIC's Urban Studies program.
I hear a lot about jobs and rights for laborers.
I personally would not want to work outside in Chicago weather either.
But nobody in the Bridgeport community where I live as well wants this facility.
It's the long-term impacts that come from this development are way more than the scope of,
unfortunately jobs it's respiratory cardiovascular impacts it's we're going to lose a large cultural
and economic staple in the south side with the stock stadium leaving a large scheme for just
and you know his private um investment and profits the city of chicago will lose profits from the
stadium itself, and the South Side will lose a big staple as well. It's not a development that's
wanted by the community or is really necessary either. Thank you. George Blakemore, followed
by Dan Johnson. Thank you, Mr. Blakemore. What do you see in here? The demographic, the race,
white, Chinese, where are the Blacks?
That's a historical racist neighborhood, Bridgeport.
What?
Bridgeport.
When they would cross and come under that underpass, they would just beat up these little black boys and girls.
So racism is still alive in Bridgeport.
Now the Chinese are coming in.
She's the author, but who is the committee man?
these white Irish and I tell you
they still run
Bridgeport. So I don't
see anybody from Wentworth here
the little black people in those
little roads. Shut up!
Ma'am, I don't see them here.
So ever again
I'm doing
exactly what I'm doing exactly
what. Hold on.
All right, well tell them they're taking my time.
They're taking my time.
All right, ma'am.
You're fine.
And the union, everybody came up representing the union.
They wasn't black.
They was white and Hispanic.
Seemed like to me racism is still alive in the city of Chicago,
and I want Trump to come and clean up this damn Democratic swamp.
And then after he cleaned it up, then I want my black people to go black.
You can kill two birds with one stone.
Let these races here, Democrats and Trump, fight each other.
But in the end, we've got to win and become black.
Self-preservation is the first law of nature.
I didn't see any union worker that was black.
I'm not blind.
So that's why it's very important for a man of Mr. Blasemore caliber to come here.
It's still racism.
It's still alive in Bridgeport.
our last speaker dan johnson good afternoon mr chairman members of the committee it's an honor
to present to this committee and to the folks i feel a little bit like jose ramirez of the
guardians because i am with the high speed rail alliance and i wanted to share just a couple of
perspectives maybe a little bit more globally one is the view that passenger rail is enormously
important to Chicago and our prosperity. Amtrak is sort of like one of our airports. Union Station
has more people going through it than Midway, and investing in our passenger rail is extremely
important. Where we want to move is that these trains ought to be coming every hour. We feel
our residents are entitled to electrified trains that are clean straight from downtown to go all
over the Midwest and the rest of the country, and the fact is we can't do it with the maintenance
facility we have today. Amtrak does need a major investment in improving its ability to maintain
the trains that we have. And the truth is, our service is not where it should be, partially
because these trains are not getting maintained as well as they could. It's just outgrown its
current facility. I would encourage one more, if we think about our city, the more vacant lots we
have, the higher property taxes have to go to cover all of that cost. And so the final piece
that I want to encourage that may be potentially an area of similarity, electrifying these tracks
and electrifying these trains. The manufactured trains that can go run on both diesel and electric
makes the entire system cleaner. I encourage the city and all stakeholders to consider further
investment in electrifying our trains so we can have more trains to more places that are cleaner.
And I appreciate the opportunity to address the council. Thank you. All right. Thank you.
Um, is Jessica Jackson, are you, are you still Jessica Jackson, you're our next speaker.
Thank you, Alderman Mitchell. Um, this crowd here today, at some point, I'm hoping that they'll be able to identify with what it is that the black community has been saying for the last three years, that we didn't want the illegal immigrants in our neighborhood, because of what they would take away from us economically, and what they would take away from us socially.
But yet and still it happened anyway. The Asian community, just like the white community, whatever, did not stand with us.
But now they're seeing how it feels for their communities to get invaded with something that they don't want.
So the next time black people have an issue and everybody want to think that it's our problem and nobody else's.
Welcome to our world. Welcome to our world. See how it feels to pay money for years and years and years and years into the system.
And then when it's time for your community and their race to be considered, it gets railroaded over.
You think about it the next time you look at black people's problem and think that it ain't nobody's problem but our own.
It's your problem, too. Thank you. Don't you say nothing to me. Don't you say nothing to me.
Ms. Jackson. No, no. I got it. No, no, no. I got me. No, no, no, no. You know what I'm saying?
That's what I'm saying. They think it's 1863. They better get their mind right.
Just like anything happens to us, it can happen to them. Once again,
thank you, Alderman Mitchell, for letting me speak. All right. All right. Thank you,
everybody, for public comment. That concludes our public comment period. I want to acknowledge
Vice Chair
Andre Vasquez, Alderman
Brian Hopkins, and Alderman Scott
Wadges back for purposes of quorum
and also want to acknowledge non-member
Nicole Lee,
Marty Quinn,
and I thought I saw Angela Clay
and Felix Cardona.
All right.
Oh, and Alderman
Will Hall. Did I miss
anyone? All right.
I move approval
of the Rule 45 report for the Committee on Transportation and Public Way
meeting held on September 9, 2026. Can I get a motion from Alderman
Yancey for approval of this item? Alderman Yancey so moves
on the motion. All in favor say aye. Opposed, no.
In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. Today we have 10 items on the agenda.
Item 1, going out of order on page 10, item 3
is a direct introduction for the 32nd Ward. Can I get
a motion from Alderman Hopkins to accept direct introduction
to committee. Alderman Hopkins, so moves.
On the motion, all in favor say aye. Opposed, no. In the opinion
of the chair, the ayes have it. Page 3, item 1, South Chicago
Property Management Company Limited. Ordinance 2026.
Issuance of a permit to
one second. Ordinance 2026-0028-751.
35751, issuance of a permit to South Chicago Property Management Company Limited to allow specialized vehicle access to the Burley Avenue Improvement Project located at 116 South Burley Avenue, 3200 East, 116th Street, and 3018 East, 114th Street.
Here to speak, we have Solomon Kodera, Assistant Chief Engineer of CDOT.
Ms. Kudera, you have your own words.
You don't have a presentation, correct?
Just my own words.
Okay.
Okay, you have the floor.
Thank you.
Introduce yourself.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.
My name is Suleiman Kudera, spelled S-O-L-I-M-A-N-K-H-U-D-E-I-R-A.
I am a section chief with the Chicago Department of Transportation.
I am presenting Ordinance 2026-28751.
I am appearing before you seeking your support of this ordinance which authorizes the issuance
of a permit to allow specialized vehicles to cross Burley Avenue and 116th Street.
The ordinance will allow South Chicago Property Management Company to cross the new Burley
Avenue at 116th Street with non-licensed heavy equipment.
The Burley Avenue project scope is to construct Burley Avenue from 106th Street to 126th place.
The construction of Burley Avenue is scheduled to start in around Q1, 2028, and will be completed in Q4, 2028.
Alderman Chico is in support of this ordinance, and he has provided a letter of support.
This concludes my presentation. I am happy to answer any questions.
Thank you. Can I get a motion to recommend approval of this item?
Audermon Conway so moves. On the motion, all in favor say aye.
Opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. Thank you, sir. Thank you.
Page 4 through 8 include 44 ordinances for miscellaneous items introduced by the local Alderman from Wards 1, 2, 3, 6, 11, 12, 15, 16, 19, 20, 21, 22, 26, 27, 28, 32, 35 through 42, 45, and 46.
Can I get a motion to recommend and approve of these items?
Alderman Yancey, so moves.
On the motion, all in favor say aye.
Opposed, no.
in the opinion of the Chair of the Ice, have it. Page 9, Item 1, Black Panther Party Heritage
Trail Historical Markers, Ordinance 2026-0028727. Per the request of Alderman Yancey, this item will
be held in committee. Page 10, Item 1, Blue Door Resubdivision, Ordinance 2026-0028919,
a proposed resubdivision in the block bounded by South Prairie Avenue, East 59th Street,
South Calumet Avenue, and East 58th Street.
Here to speak, we have Catherine O'Brien, architect.
Is Ms. O'Brien around?
Is that her?
Okay.
I can't.
Can you allow her to come to the front or at least to the box?
You know what?
Come to the front.
Yes.
Right here.
Nando, where are we?
We're looking to take a 90 by 161.
Excuse me, can you introduce yourself?
Kathy O'Brien, architect of record.
Blue Door Subdivision is looking to take a section of vacant land that was purchased that was 90 by 161
and subdivided into three individual lots.
We're clearing up some historical record information by doing so.
That's all.
Oh, that was short. Do we have any questions from members of the committee?
All right. There are no questions. All right. There is no compensation due to this project.
The committee has received and reviewed a letter of support from Alderman Taylor.
Can I get a motion to recommend approval of these items?
Alderman Vice Chair Vasquez so moves. On the motion, all in favor say aye.
Opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it.
Page 10, Item 2, Omni Halstead Street, Chicago, LLC.
Ordinance 2026-0029-052
A proposed resubdivision of certain lots in the block bounded by North Halstead Street to the west
North Branch Canal to the east
The north branch of the Chicago River to the south
And the east-west line running perpendicular to and intersecting at approximately 935 North Halstead Street
Here to speak and calling to the box is Paul Purewall, Vice President of Development, Ryan Fitzgerald, Development Manager, and Katie Janky-Dale, Legal Counsel.
As much as I said your name.
We did it.
Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.
My name is Katie Janky-Dale from the law firm of DLA Piper.
and we represent Ani Halstead, the applicant for this subdivision.
I have Paul Purawall and Ryan Fitzgerald with the applicant here with me today.
This subdivision is just to effectuate the Halstead Point project that is currently under construction with Phase 1 shown on the screen.
It's pretty straightforward.
We've worked very closely with SIDA as well as Alderman Burnett, who I believe issued a letter of support.
But we're all here if you have any questions about the request.
You can go ahead and proceed.
so it's pretty straightforward it's just dividing it it's currently one lot dividing it into
uh the four that are shown on this screen um but with that we respectfully request
your favorable support okay um are there any questions from members of the committee
Alderman Gutierrez.
Thank you, Chairman.
Just on purposes, because I can't see too small.
What zone each lot will be?
Is that residential?
Is that going to be – if she can explain a little bit more about the project, that will be helpful.
Thank you.
I'll do all with the awning group.
Just addressing your question, all of the lots on the northwest, northeast, and the southeast are residential.
The Southwest is a hotel.
What is the zoning designation for each parcel?
It's a plan development.
Oh, it's PD.
Okay.
That's good.
Thank you.
That way we knew it was some houses and some, like, we just saw different lines.
We couldn't see what it was.
So it is so helpful that they describe what it's going to become.
Thank you.
All right.
Thank you for calling that out.
All right.
Any more questions for members of the body?
All right.
There is no compensation due for this project.
The committee has received and reviewed a letter of support from Alderman Burnett.
Can I get a motion to recommend approval of this item?
Alderman Conway, so moves.
On the motion, all in favor say aye.
Aye.
Opposed, no.
Any opinion of the chair, the ayes have it.
Thank you.
Case 10, item 3, Foundry Park Properties, KP7 LLC, ordinance 20260029223.
Thank you.
What do you want to say?
All right. So repeating, page 10, item 3, Foundry Park Properties, KP7, LLC, Ordinance 2026-0029-223,
a proposed subdivision in the block bounded by West Dickens Avenue, North Kingsbury Street,
North Branch of the Chicago River to the south, and North Elston Avenue.
I have been informed they also have a related ordinance, and I'm going to call them both together.
Page 11, Item 1, Foundry Park Properties, KP7, LLC, Ordinance 2026-0028839, a proposed vacation of the area bounded by West Cortland Street, West Dickens Avenue, North Southport Avenue, and North Branch of the Chicago River.
Here to speak, we have Andrew Scott and Aaron Dorsey.
It's just going to be Mr. Chairman.
My name is Andrew Scott with the law office of Dyke McGossett on behalf of the petitioner.
Okay.
Go ahead and give a brief description.
Yes, go ahead.
Okay.
So thanks very much.
The property that's before you, it's kind of the – it's formerly known as the Lincoln Yard site.
It's the north half of Lincoln Yard.
It's been renamed Foundry Park, and it's about a 30-acre piece of property.
We've been going through the development process, the zoning process over the last year,
And essentially what this does is that it vacates and dedicates a variety of rights of way within the property that you just described.
It also subdivides the property into up to 61 different lots of record that will allow the implementation of the master site plan that you see before you.
It's a combination of up to 3,700 residential units, 500,000 square feet of retail.
There's eight acres of parks, riverwalk, all sorts of public amenities.
And there's also a number of infrastructure improvements that are critical to the area in terms of building out new streets, rehabbing new streets, redoing traffic signalization, traffic crossings within the surrounding area, surrounding property.
So I'm available to answer any questions.
And if none, we'd appreciate your favorable support.
Are there any questions from members of the committee?
Alderman Wadgespeck, do you have any?
Chairman, thank you very much.
First of all, I want to thank your staff for finally getting this correct with a mistake on my part.
The original document was attached, I think, when I submitted it to the city clerk and wasn't recognized as a separate document.
So I want to say thanks to your staff for coordinating this.
But as Mr. Scott says, these are going to be over 3,500 new residential units in this area with over 20 percent affordable.
And the local construction hires and I think final.
In terms of the business community is going to be well over 40 percent, if I'm not mistaken.
So happy to see that these will all be local construction jobs or majority.
But I would just ask for the the favorable consideration of the committee to pass this item.
Thank you. Thank you, Alderman. Just want to make sure I call both the ordinances together.
So. Are you on separately if.
Yeah, I'll pass on a second separately. Yes. So you just spoke about the first ordinance.
Correct. I was speaking about them collectively. I can I can speak to them individually, but.
OK, no, you spoke around collective. Are there any questions for members of the body?
OK. Auderman Irving. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Is this the former, what was that site, Lincoln Yards?
Is this that former Lincoln Yards site?
That is correct.
It's the north half of it.
The north half of it.
The north half of it, yes.
And what's going to happen with the other half of it?
That is under separate ownership, and I have heard that there have been discussions,
preliminary discussions between city staff and the owner, but I don't know specifically.
And is the request still the same as it relates to the TIF and all the infrastructure stuff?
Is that still the same?
This is all in furtherance of the TIF that came before city council last month, yes.
But this is different.
This is not the same Lincoln Yard.
So this is just the north half of the former Lincoln Yards.
It's approximately 30 acres.
And so I guess I'm not sure I understand.
I guess what I'm really asking is, are we looking – are we going to need to spend more money to make this go, or is it less money, or what are we looking at fiscally from the development of this parcel?
So our hope is to be able – we were – we've come to agreement with the city and has passed TIF for the project.
Our hope is to bring everything in under budget as to what we propose to the city, but all the money is there to be able to start.
We're submitting permits within, I want to say, the next 30 days, and you'll see a real activity out there hopefully within the next six months.
Okay. Now, I guess in relation to Lincoln Yards, is this more or less than what the anticipated expenses were?
This is less.
Okay. All right. That's good. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Okay. For Chairman Irvin's purposes, Novak Construction bought the southern portions from a different bank than JDL did.
JDL's north side of it, Novak the south.
Some of the parcels have already started to develop separately from that overall Lincoln Yards plan.
So they've sold off some small pieces.
There will be different types of project, not a large development in terms of residential like this.
So there will be different ideas coming forward.
Alderman Hopkins and I also have an issue and connection with the Cortland Bridge and access across the river.
So there could in the future be TIF requests for funding of infrastructure.
But everything that was in the TIF request here was for infrastructure.
And it's significantly less than the original Lincoln Yards project.
The but that was I thought that was already contemplated.
So you all essentially scrapped the Lincoln Yards deal and kind of like start from starting over.
Correct. OK. All right. Very well. Thank you, Chairman.
Alderman Hopkins. Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I support this subdivision, support the project, and I support Alderman Wagesbeck's comment about the future needs not being addressed yet, but there's time to do that.
And I simply want to point out that in the map you're looking at, you see the Cortland Bridge, which is currently out of service,
and that area where we are subdividing with potential for 3,500 new homes and, you know, probably double that for the number of new residents.
If this project was done today, those residents would not be able to cross the river.
They would basically live east of the Chicago River, and, you know, God help them if their child's daycare center is on the west side of the Chicago River.
So that's the reality that we're dealing with today. Again, this project is a multi-year project, probably 10 years for the complete horizon of its construction in multiple phases.
So there will be adequate time going forward to address the infrastructure and transportation needs.
But to Alderman Irvin's point, right now we're committed to spending much less. If you spend less, you get less.
And the need for this infrastructure build-out is substantially more than we currently have before us.
We have an opportunity in the future to address that.
I'm confident we will, and I'm confident as this project goes forward,
those needs will be met by the increment growth in the Cortland River TIF.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
You're welcome.
Any more questions from the committee members?
All right.
For Ordinance 2026-0029-223, there is no compensation due for this project.
The committee has received and reviewed a letter of support from Alderman Wadgespac.
Can I get a motion to recommend approval of this item?
Alderman Gutierrez, so moves on the motion.
All in favor say aye.
Opposed, no.
In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it.
Regarding Ordinance 2026-0028-839, there is no compensation due for this part of the project.
And the committee has received and reviewed a letter of support from Alderman Wadgesback.
Can I get a motion to recommend approval of this item?
Hopkins, so moves.
On the motion, all in favor say aye.
Opposed, no.
In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it.
Page 10, item 4, Blues, Etc. LLC.
Ordinance 2026-0029-053.
A proposed re-subdivision of certain lots in the block bounded by North Halstead Street, West Wrightwood Avenue, North Burling Street, and West Fullerton Avenue.
Here to speak, we have Thomas Moore, Attorney McCarthy Duffy LLP, and Mohamed El-Dibbini.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.
This ordinance would...
Please state your name.
I'm sorry. I am Thomas S. Moore, and with me today is Dr. Mohamed Aldebarri Bainey.
And this ordinance would correct a mistake apparently made in the 1870s right after the Chicago Fire,
where one subdivision of 24-foot lots came south from Wrightwood,
and another of 25-foot lots came north from Fullerton,
and there was a two-foot, two-inch gap between them.
Dr. Eldobaney bought the iconic blues bar, was going to restore it,
and when he went to get a permit, the zoning department was unable to approve it
because even though the record shows over the 100 years from buyer to seller
to seller to buyer, this 25-foot lot, it's not a recorded lot
because the recorded lot is only 24 feet.
So with the alderman's help, we were able to get support of the community
and of Title Company, and we have Alderman Knutson's support, and we request your support as well.
Thank you.
Are there any questions from members of the committee?
All right.
There is no compensation due for this project.
The committee has received and reviewed a letter of support from Alderman Knutson.
Can I get a motion from Vice Chair Vasquez to recommend approval of this item?
Alderman Vasquez so moves.
On the motion, all in favor say aye.
Opposed, no.
Independent of the chair, the ayes have it.
Thank you very much. Page 11, item 2, Chicago Suite Connection Group, LLC. Ordinance 2026-0020753. A proposed vacation of public alleys in the area bounded by West Bryn Mawr Avenue, North Mead Avenue, and North Northwest Highway. Here to speak on this item is Kathleen Ropka, attorney Stotis and Beard.
Good morning.
Good morning.
My name is Kathleen Ropka, R-O-P-K-A, and I'm the attorney for the applicants.
And today also with me is Peter Kalis, K-A-I-L-I-S, and he is the director of operations of the applicants.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee for hearing us today.
We are appearing before you today in support of the applicants, and that is Chicago.
Suite Connection Group, LLC, and Chicago Suite Connection Group 2, LLC.
This is their proposal to vacate a V-shaped alley in the block in the 45th Ward
bounded by West Bryn Mawr Avenue, North Mead Avenue, and North Northwest Highway in Chicago.
The entrance and the exit to this alley are both on Bryn Mawr Avenue.
The applicants own all the properties that are adjacent to this alley,
and those properties are located at 6101 through 6133 West Brentmore Avenue,
5542 through 5568 North Mead Avenue, and 5563 through 5595 North Northwest Highway.
The alley does not serve any other users in this block.
It is a V-shaped alley.
Currently, Chicago Sweet Connection Bakery operates out of the applicant's property.
This bakery has been doing business at the property since 1999 and enjoys approximately 135 employees.
As for the purpose of the vacation, applicants do not have current plans to alter or change the alley.
However, their intentions are to eventually extend the existing properties over the alley, thereby providing additional space for the bakery and creating additional jobs.
Furthermore, the applicants were provided with a letter from Alderman James Gardner advising that he has no objection to this particular alley application.
At this point, or in conclusion, we would ask that the committee approve the applicant's alley vacation application and the vacation ordinance.
All right. Thank you. Are there any questions for members of the committee?
Alderman Conwin?
I just noted the odd choice words there. Is there a letter of support on file from the Alderman of the 45th Board here?
It is.
Okay. Okay, because she said has no opinion or so. Great. Wonderful. Thank you.
Move to pass, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. There's no compensation due for this project.
No, I'm sorry. The compensation due for this project is $200,000.
The committee has received and reviewed a letter of support from Alderman Gardner on the motion to recommend approval from Alderman Conway.
All those in favor say aye. Opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it.
Thank you.
xrpr portage park llc ordinance 2026-0027-066 a proposed vacation of public alleys in the area
bounded by north milwaukee avenue north keel patrick avenue and former west byron street
right of way here to speak on this item is katrina s mcguire attorney
good morning mr chairman okay miss mcguire good morning mr chairman members of the committee
katrina mcguire from thompson coburn here on behalf of the applicant xrpr portage park
llc um with a vacation of about approximately 1500 square foot triangular piece um this is
bounded by north milwaukee avenue north kilpatrick and the former west byron street right of way
The purpose of this vacation is in order to redevelop a larger site that has been approved as a planned development, a mixed-use development with approximately 253 residential units and a commercial component on the north end.
And so this vacation has always been contemplated as part and parcel of the larger redevelopment piece, and we do enjoy Alderman Gardner's support for the project as well as the vacation.
Thank you. Are there any questions from the members of the committee?
Thank you, Chairman. Mr. McGuire, are there any restrictions on the use of that triangle?
It looks like it might be utilized for.
pick up or drop off of contain uh refuse containers or what what would it be uh no it's
it's there's a various it's a if you look up on the um i'm sorry if you back up one slide that
has the actual development plan the piece that's being vacated is a smaller piece of that triangle
or at the south end it's not the entire triangle does that help answer your question yes yeah okay
thank you it's part of the walkway through the development any more questions
All right. The conversation due for this project is $50,000. The committee has received and reviewed a letter of support from Alderman Gardner. Can I get a motion to recommend approval of this item? Alderman, in wide respect, so moves. On the motion, all in favor say aye. Opposed, no. Any opinion of the chair, the ayes have it.
Thank you.
All right. Page two, item one, a resolution opposing proposed Amtrak Midwest Maintenance Facility, resolution 020260028877.
Call for hearings on Amtrak Midwest maintenance facility site selection, alternatives, federal environmental review, and possible effects on nearby community and shared rail operations.
Here to speak on this item is Stephen Sagerlin from Amtrak, Adam Chudos from Sterling Bay, Lynn Lydell, BFW Environmental Engineering, Eric Lynn, Canal Edge, Matt Moss, FH Passion Harbor Joint Venture,
Adam Thies
WSP
Crystal Zorba
Mullins
Susanna Campbell
BFW Environmental Engineering
via Zoom
Give us a few minutes while we get
everybody in place
Where's Vasquez?
Audemann Lee
How do you want to put it in?
And Dr. Kate Lowe. All right. Starting from the front, can you go? So I don't know who I'll make sure I check off everybody.
I'm going to do it this way. Stephen Surglin. Adam Chudos. Lynn Lydell.
Here. Eric Lynn.
Morning.
Matt Moss. Adam Thies. Crystal Zarba. Good morning. And Susanna Campbell. Susanna Campbell. Are you with us remotely? Yes.
Oh, Susanna Campbell is from BFW, Environment and Engineering.
Before we start, I want to acknowledge Auderman Dow, non-members of the committee.
Who else do we have?
Oh, Alderman Chico. No, I'm a member. All right. So this can go as best as possible. First, I want to offer the affected Alderman and the sponsor of the resolution. If you would like to speak first, I'm giving you latitude to do that.
Okay. All right. So we'll start with the presentation.
Great. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Members of the committee, good morning.
My name is Stephen Segerlin, and I lead commercial development at Amtrak,
including our partnerships with private companies on projects like this one.
Thank you for inviting Amtrak to present.
We understand how important this project is to your constituents
and that there are many questions.
We're glad to provide more information.
and to answer questions, as we've done at two community meetings in August and September,
and in one-on-one meetings with city, county, state, and federal elected officials.
Our presentation runs about 20, 25 minutes, followed by the committee's questions.
If we can go to the next slide.
What we're presenting today is information we've presented to the community at our community
meetings in August and September, so you can be aware of what information we've been sharing.
After introducing the project team, we'll briefly recap what the project is and why it's needed,
then we'll walk through the questions we've heard most since our first community meeting.
If we can go to the next slide. As everyone here knows, just about every train in America
runs through Chicago. Chicago is the hub of Amtrak's national and regional network. So what
happens in Chicago yard is felt across the country. At its core, this project is about bringing
Amtrak's trains and maintenance facility in Chicago into a state of good repair. That means
more reliable trains, better on-time performance, and fewer equipment-related delays for passengers
who rely on them. Before getting into the details, I'd like to introduce the three
organizations delivering the project. You'll also hear today from our design and environmental
advisors. Amtrak on this project is the sponsor. We've received the federal grants, and once the
facility is complete, Amtrak will begin its operations. Our development partner is Canal
Edge, represented by Eric Lynn. I'll let him introduce himself. Thank you. Good morning,
Chairman Mitchell and members of the committee. I'm Eric Lynn of Canal Edge, the partner with
Hamtrak in this public-private partnership to build this modernized maintenance facility at
the Canal Street Yard. Thank you for the invitation to appear and speak before you, answer your
questions here this morning. We look forward to transparently discussing the project that will
bring over $900 million of investment to the city of Chicago and creating over 3,000 union jobs,
strengthening Chicago as the transit hub for the Midwest region and the nation.
Looking forward to speaking with you and answering your questions.
Thank you.
I'd now like to introduce Matt from Passion.
Thank you, Eric.
Thank you.
My name is Matt Moss.
I'm the vice president and project executive of FH Passion Harbor Joint Venture.
We're working with the development team on the pre-construction and procurement process for the Midwest Maintenance Facility.
FH Passion and Harbor are two local Chicagoland contractors.
Our joint venture was formed to build this facility as a construction manager and general contractor.
We'll be pre-qualifying and hiring specialty subcontractors.
And as construction starts, we'll be leading and managing the work on site.
Thank you.
Thank you, Matt.
If we can go to the next slide, let us get started with where the project is located so it's clear what are in its limits and what is not a part of it.
The project is at the Canal Street Yard, the elevated rail yard between Canal and Stewart from just north of Saramak to Pershing.
All project work stays within the existing yard.
This map shows the yard in two halves, the north half on the top and the south half on the bottom.
on both north points to the right. In the north half between 26th and 29th are train storage
and the car wash. The trailer parking north of 26th already exists. In the south half between
33rd and 35th is the train shed, the main building where Amtrak's maintenance activities will take
place. If we go to the next slide. The project addresses two needs. First, our existing yard
at 14th Street is aging. It costs more and more to operate each year and requires more frequent
repairs. Second, Amtrak is changing how it maintains trains. At 14th Street, the yard's
layout means crews must split trains apart and work on the pieces over several days. What we
want is to service a complete train every day, which requires one building large enough to fit
a full train. It also gives our employees a modern, safe place to work and to also conduct
their activities indoors, particularly in winter. During this process, we've been asked many times,
why not simply modernize 14th Street Yard? The reason is because the yard services every Amtrak
train in Chicago today, and it has to keep doing that every day. Rebuilding it in place would mean
constructing around live operations for years in phases with parts of the yard being put out of
service at any given time. During those outages, trains would have to be serviced with less space
or moved elsewhere for maintenance. That means more delays and extensive service disruptions
for passengers. Phasing construction around an active yard with live operations also takes longer
and costs more. On a separate site, Amtrak can build a new facility while 14th Street keeps
running and then move our operations over once the new facility is ready. The project also brings
benefits to the neighborhood, repairs to aging and crumbling viaducts with better lighting
underneath, improved area security, and jobs. About 3,000 construction workers during build-out,
including union and skilled trades, and about 400 workers in operations, including mechanics
and electricians. If we go to the next slide. Since our first community meeting in August,
we've heard a consistent set of questions from residents. Six come up most frequently.
When and why was this yard selected? What will Amtrak's daily operations look like?
What will be built? What environmental review was done? And why was a categorical exclusion
the appropriate approval? And what is the process with the city? Could we go to the next slide?
today's presentation is organized around those six questions and so is our project website
we wanted to make sure that the committee is aware of the information already available to
the public the website is mwmaintenancefacility.com which went live in early september mw stands for
midwest it includes the project history the site plan summaries of environmental studies
and federal approvals under NEPA, the National Environmental Policy Act, and answers to
frequently asked questions with more, I think, 50 coming on 60. The website is updated regularly
and today's presentation will be posted there. If we go to the next slide. Now getting into the
details, let me first explain how we got here and when the yard was selected. Before 2023,
Amtrak evaluated three primary options, rebuilding the 14th Street Yard in place, as I mentioned, the Global One site on Western Ave and Canal Street.
Amtrak chose Canal Street, and in 2023, the state rail plan identified the yard as an acquisition target, and Amtrak has coordinated since with public agencies and stakeholders.
Under NEPA, the Federal Railroad Administration, not Amtrak, is the agency that makes the environmental decision.
FRA's review happened in two steps.
In 2025, FRA completed its NEPA review of Amtrak's acquisition of the yard.
Then for the site improvements, Amtrak's team prepared technical studies covering 12 environmental resource areas, submitted them to FRA.
They reviewed those studies and in May of this year issued a NEPA determination.
In between, Canal Edge joined as a delivery partner, and Amtrak applied for federal grants, and in August, FRA announced those grant awards.
We'll return to the environmental review and FRA's determination in more detail later in the presentation, but if we can go to the next slide, we want to cover why the yard was selected.
There are five reasons for the selection of the yard.
One, it is an existing rail yard and has been for over a century.
There is no change in its historic land use, and importantly, no residential or parkland will be acquired.
Two, it's close to Union Station, only about a quarter mile farther than the existing yard entrance point,
and it can be reached on tracks that Amtrak owns or dispatches.
A more distant yard means longer trips that cause delays.
Three, it's the right size with acreage similar to the existing yard.
Other sites were much larger or smaller than the project's needs.
Global One also had availability, dispatching, routing, and other construction issues.
four it's the right shape the long linear footprint is ideal for the track layout and
operations a full train can pull in without loop tracks and without being split which is exactly
the problem we have at 14th street and lastly five the owner was willing to sell rail yards rarely
come onto the market and are rarely sold these are very complex transactions to negotiate
and ourselves took a significant amount of time to get the owner there.
If we go to the next slide, we want to cover our train operations and use of the yard
and walk you through the cycle of a single train on its turn to get ready for service.
After dropping off its passengers at Union Station, a train moves down to the yard
and will first stop at the car wash, picture on the left, in the northern half.
This is a photo of Amtrak's current car wash.
The new one will use a similar type of equipment and layout.
Second, the train will continue to the train shed in the south half,
and inside the building we will construct.
Crews will inspect the train and test the brakes.
They fuel it and make minor repairs.
They restock the cafe cars, clean the restrooms, and fill water tanks.
This photo is from Amtrak's new facility in Seattle and shows the type of quality, safe indoor space that we're trying to build for our employees.
Heavy repairs will not be done at this facility at Canal Street.
Those require trains to come out of service for days to months, and we currently do those activities in the existing shop at our 16th Street Yard, which is south of the St. Charles Airline, at Brighton Park, which is a little bit west, and at Beach Grove in Indiana.
Yeah. Third and finally, the train will move to storage after maintenance and servicing back on the north half of the yard, and the trains will sit there until its next trip.
The vast majority of this activity happens during the days. Trains move through the yard at very slow speeds of 5 to 10 miles per hour.
overnight activity is limited a small crew prepares trains for the morning cleaning interiors
servicing restrooms restocking during that time the train sits still plugged in with engines off
and not idling these trains already operate in and out of chicago this project changes where
they are serviced it does not add trains
lines.
To walk through what we built in much more detail than this high-level introduction,
I want to turn the microphone over to Adam Theiss of WSP, the project's design consultant.
Thanks, Stephen.
I'm Adam Theiss with WSP.
WSP is the engineering and design firm on this project.
There was an earlier slide that Stephen showed that showed the project as highlighted in blue with no detail.
but this slide and the next three slides will show a little bit more detail about the yard
working north to south in four sections so just to get you oriented north is on the left hand
side of this of this page and will be for the next few slides we start at the river on the left
and end on pershing for this section of the project i would point out that there is the
legend in the lower left hand corner that by using colors lays out the different components of the
project, either access roads, existing boundaries. The boundary does not change. The yard work in
this project stays within existing boundaries. The green dash lines are fences, track work,
new buildings will be pointed out as we go through the slides. Gray represents underground
stormwater basins holding stormwater, and et cetera. So we'll go through those in detail as
we flip through the slides. This first section runs from the river past Cermak and Archer,
ending around 24th Street. This stretch links the new yard to Union Station. The work here is
fairly limited. It's mostly existing track with slight modifications. There is a green line on
this page that shows the fence around the existing truck and trailer portion. The existing truck
parking area will be used for staff parking. Next slide. Continuing working our way from north to
south, left to right, we have fence continuing around the project. Track work starts as we head
south, leading to the north yard. This portion of the project runs from 24th Street to 29th Street
and passes the Stevenson and the Dan Rine. This portion of the yard contains the first stop for
trains on their typical day as pointed out by Steven. This is where the car wash building
exists. It's the blue L-shaped building just to the south of the Dan Ryan. The purple lines you
see are within the yard around that wash building. Our storage tracks will trains will wait for their
next trip. Also in this section between the Stevenson and 25th place, there's an existing
abandoned building that will be removed. Along the west tracks are underground stormwater basins
shown in gray. They hold rainwater during storms. This yard currently does not have that function,
so this will be an improvement to the elevated yard. At the bottom of the section, an access
road heads south. Finally, the access road continues. It's outlined in brown. It continues
headed south, leading us to the additional portions of the site. Next slide. Section 3
runs from 29th Street to 35th Street. The northern portion of this section consists of access road
and a narrow band of track work highlighted in magenta. Access road and tracks will both be
repaired and or replaced within this corridor. At 33rd Street, the main building starts. That's
the maintenance and inspection building, shown in blue. It's stop two on the train's typical
circuit of its day. Next to it, along canal, is another stormwater basin. There's also support
equipment for the maintenance and inspection building, a salt shed, a generator, and lubricant
tanks. Next slide. Section four is what we call the south yard. It runs from 35th Street toward
38th. The train shed or maintenance and inspection building
in blue ends at 35th. South of that building
is the track yard for more storage, shown in pink.
Trains use it to get in and out of the building as they go through the maintenance
cycle. Along the canal side is more support
equipment, diesel fuel tanks, sand silos, a sanitary service
station for train restrooms, storage for train wheels,
air compressors, a steam generator, et cetera.
There's additional stormwater basins in this area as well.
These drawings show where the design stands today.
They will continue to change as design continues,
and new versions will be posted on the website as those are created.
Next slide.
One of the questions asked is what will be the impact from the street view?
So we've created these street views.
These photos, street views were taken using street-level photos taken roughly a month ago.
We've added the new building into them to show the impact.
We'll start at 33rd Street, which is the north end of the maintenance and inspection building.
So this is the current view.
And then if you go to the next slide, you can see a small corner over 33rd Street presenting itself.
If we go to the next slide, we can see the outline of the maintenance and inspection building through the trees.
This image shows trees with the tree leaves faded, mimicking what one would see in winter.
The building is set back inside the yard.
It's not at the street edge.
At the corner, the nearest homes are about 120 feet away from this facility, measured corner to corner.
Next slide.
This is the 35th Street view.
looking south or looking northeast toward lot G.
This is the current view.
If you switch to the next slide, you can see the outline of the building through the trees.
These are just two of the views created to date, again, using existing street view photos.
Design is still ongoing, and we will continue to share any updated renderings created as the project continues on the project website.
To address the next slide, I'll hand it back to Stephen Sagerlin.
Thank you. Talking about the yard history, we want to give some context about the age.
It was first built in the late 1800s, and then in the early 1900s, it was elevated, which allowed for the street grid to be continued beneath it, creating the series of viaducts that you see today.
It has been in railroad use ever since its creation.
And if we go to the next slide, at its peak, the yard was a freight intermodal facility handling more than 150,000 container lifts a year.
That meant stacked containers, boxcars, hopper cars 10 to 20 feet tall, and rubber-tired gantry cranes 40 to 60 feet tall operating across the yard, which some of these images illustrate.
That is the use that this property was built for, and it remains railroad property today.
And I want to now transition and invite Susanna Campbell of BFW Environmental Engineers to summarize the environmental studies and review.
And she's joining us remotely. So, Susanna, can we hear you?
Yes. Thanks, Stephen.
Good morning, everybody. I'm Susanna Campbell.
As Stephen said, I am with Bacon Farmer Workman Environmental Engineering.
We are the company that was in charge of performing the environmental reviews, which were studied for this project as part of the Federal Railroad Administration review.
And there were 12 different resource areas that we evaluated, and all of these were supported by technical studies, which, again, we submitted to FRA for their review.
So as you can see there on the screen, we looked at noise, vibration, water quality and stormwater, transportation, air quality, cultural resources, biological resources.
We looked at floodplains, wetlands and navigable waters, soil and hazardous materials, groundwater, coastal zone and public safety.
Next slide, please.
To go into detail about these, noise is probably the one that we've heard the most about between noise and vibration.
And what we did is we did several different studies.
We did a noise study which evaluated eight different spots around the yard for 24-hour measurements,
as well as a lot of other measuring locations, I think upwards of 33.
And we modeled these for future noise and current noise.
There were four spots along the tracks that did indicate that the noise impacts were moderate.
The rest of the locations found no impact.
Federal rules call that after it's a moderate impact, there is no mitigation requirement,
but we have been looking at different mitigation measures if that was something that we wanted to consider.
The vibration study found no vibration impacts, trains move slowly across this yard, and each yard track sees a limited number of moves per day.
For air quality, construction and operation emissions were screened against EPA methods.
And these were found to be below the general conformity de minimis thresholds that the state requires.
So there was no conformity determination required.
For cultural resources, we did two different studies.
We looked at above ground resources and we looked at below ground resources.
The Armour Square and Commonwealth Edison building were evaluated under the Section 106 ruling.
and we submitted this to the SHPO and they determined there would be no adverse effects
with regards to this project. And that was done in April of 26.
For soil and hazardous materials, we actually performed a phase one and a phase two test
report for the site. Over 45 borings were done and we collected over 235 soil samples.
And what we found is that there were some constituents in the soil, but they were typical of freight and rail contamination in the historic fill.
And these were found to be determined that we could manage these during construction per EPA standards.
Groundwater is shallow in this area, but it is non-potable, meaning it will not be used for drinking water.
and the project has no intention of discharging any water to storm or sanitary sewers and any
groundwater that we encounter during the construction has to be properly managed on site
in accordance with applicable requirements and these are related to handling and disposal
measures. We looked at water quality and stormwater per the state's guidelines for IEPA
for NPDES construction projects. Anything that disturbs more than one acre requires a stormwater
permit, and this stormwater permit determines how you will handle your stormwater discharge
for the construction. And so we had to submit this to the state. These stormwater plans, along with
erosion and sediment controls, will be completed. And it should be noted there's no protected
drinking water sources anywhere near this project. As part of the transportation, we did a traffic
assessment, and rail network simulation studies. There will be short-term construction trips.
There are no long-term impacts expected to rail operations, roads, or parking.
For biological resources, we looked at state and federal threatened endangered species.
We found that the site had no suitable habitat for any of the species that were found,
and so there's no effect on protected wildlife. We looked at floodplains, wetlands, and navigable
waters. The site is elevated and is not within any mapped 100-year floodplain or regulated
floodways, and there were also no wetlands or waters of the U.S. affected, so there were no
permits required for those. If you look at the Illinois Coastal Management Program zone,
there are about two acres which fall within this zone for this site, but since this site is elevated,
there's no in-water work, and so therefore there's no effect on coastal resources and no permits
required for public safety there's um there will be perimeter fencing and there's about 4 600
linear feet of new fencing being put in and approximately 5 200 linear feet of replacement
fencing that is also planned there's going to be no new public crossings and there will be
controlled gated access maintained throughout this project's construction and i'll turn this
over to Crystal Zorbaugh with our team. Good morning. So, one of the biggest questions that
we got was what federal NEPA or environmental approvals were obtained. This project received
a categorical exclusion. I want to tell you what a categorical exclusion is, and it is not.
A categorical exclusion is a federal finding that a project will not individually or cumulatively
exceed the thresholds of significant impact to the environment.
It requires detailed technical studies, the 12 that Susanna just described for you,
of specified resource areas.
It can only be granted if the finding is no significant impacts
and no unusual circumstances are found.
Why is a categorical exclusion appropriate for this project?
There is no change of land use.
This has been a rail yard since the 1800s and continues to be a rail yard.
Some people have said that since 2019, the use has changed, but the fact of the matter, it has continued to be a freight rail yard and has been in continuous use consistently since the 1800s.
All construction will be within the limits of the existing century-old rail yard footprint.
and there will be no residential or commercial displacement resulting from this project.
Because of these 12 detailed studies and all of the findings therein,
we were able to use this manner to complete the environmental review,
and the federal government completed that review on May 12th.
Thank you.
I'm going to turn it back over to Stephen.
Thanks, Crystal.
regarding coordination with the city Amtrak wants to closely collaborate city staff can comment on
the environmental studies design and engineering plans that includes issues most important to the
restaurant residents also including fire and life safety emergency access design and code
compliance utility connections effects on the streets sidewalks and traffic many many topics
Amtrak will weigh the city's input alongside the facility's safety, engineering, and operational requirements and will obtain the government authorizations identified through the federal process.
Coordination will also continue on environmental management during construction and traffic management and circulation during the viaduct repairs, which is the work the residents will notice most.
Once viaduct work is scheduled, we expect to share traffic management plans in advance.
Going to the next slide, coming to the end here.
Before we take your questions, a few resources we want to offer to you and your constituents,
the project website that I mentioned, mwmaintenancefacility.com, MW for Midwest again.
and we will continue to update it as design and construction plans progress.
Residents can email info at mwmaintenancefacility.com or call 708-475-0990.
For an urgent safety issue at the yard, call Amtrak Police at 800-331-008 any hour.
We're adding staff to respond to inquiries faster, and we're glad to help your offices answer constituent questions directly, and we offer individual briefings for any member.
With that, I imagine there are many questions.
We have our whole team here and very much look forward to addressing them comprehensively.
All right.
Thank you for that presentation.
I'll call on Audemann Lee.
Oh, I'm sorry. Jumping the gun. Dr. Kate Lowe. Where is she?
Is she?
Thank you.
Do we have a presentation for her?
I don't have slides. Sorry. But I want to thank the chairman and the committee for having me here today.
And I want to recognize that Amtrak is a local and national asset. I was thrilled to write Amtrak this summer.
That said, its proposed relocation of maintenance functions to Chinatown, Armour Square, and Bridgeport has not come with publication of an alternatives analysis.
We have also not heard a conversation about the appearance of a conflict of interest with a public-private partnership that has expressed owners with visions for the current sites.
We've heard many arguments for the relocation today.
There's collective benefits from Amtrak.
We've heard about progress.
We've heard we don't want to lose those federal dollars.
We've also heard about economic development and expanded capacity.
As someone who studied transportation, these arguments sound familiar.
They sound just like what highway builders said.
I want to recognize, of course, there's limits to that comparison.
um i'm much more of a fan of amtrak than highways for many reasons including sustainability and i
do want to recognize there is no eminent domain with this project yet it is still part of a
larger historic pattern claims of collective benefits and progress at the expense of the
less affluent and the less privileged in this case it is worsening environmental burdens in
the neighborhoods of Chinatown, Armour Square, and Bridgeport. Dr. A.J. Kim and I published an
op-ed in the Tribune where you can see some of the imagery that shows the concentration
of environmental harms near the proposed yard.
That archived, because we know EPA has changed, that archived environmental justice screening tool combines health burdens as well as demographic factors.
There is multiple cumulative impacts of this shift, including things like already existing exposure to cancerous particulate matter in the proposed relocation, as well as health vulnerabilities, including high rates of disability and lower income.
We also know many schools are near the proposed site, including the Healy Elementary, which I know is a huge asset to the community.
I want to recognize another difference with the highway era.
We've passed important federal legislation, the National Environmental Policy Act, fun fact, signed by Nixon.
That requires extensive review and public participation for significant federally funded projects.
And I want to bring to the committee's attention the processes surrounding the red line extension, surrounding the north through stable Lakeshore Drive.
Those are both processes that are mandated because of NEPA.
However, we see with this project, Amtrak has sought and received a categorical exclusion.
I'm concerned because we already heard from this team, studies conducted in April, that as of yet, yesterday, I don't know what's happened this morning.
But as of yesterday, we don't see those technical analyses on the project website.
So as someone concerned about the history of environmental injustice in transportation, I feel a little in the dark, and I know many people do.
I dispute the claim that it's not a change in land use.
This is a vacant site.
I'm privileged to live in a community that had a rails-to-trail project.
So the 606 was purchased by the city for $1 and $100,000 in administrative fees.
I think the communities surrounding this unused rail yard deserve a process and consideration for alternative futures.
And the city, like other cities, can consider challenging categorical exclusion.
Thank you.
Doctor, can you introduce yourself?
You didn't do it at the beginning of your...
Oh, I'm sorry.
My name is Dr. Kate Lowe.
I'm faculty at the University of Illinois, Chicago.
I received my Ph.D. from Cornell University.
Okay.
All right.
Audemant Lee?
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
And if I could ask Dr. Lowe to just state her area of study, that'd be great.
Sure.
I study transportation policy.
I look both at policy and intergovernmental processes, as well as qualitative and community-based questions.
So equity and transportation is core to my focus area.
Thank you very much, Dr. Lowe, and thank you so much for being here today.
I know that was not without some juggling of your schedule to be here.
So we really greatly appreciate your flexibility and your willingness to be here.
Thank you for the invitation.
Yes.
Mr. Chair, thank you so much, esteemed colleagues and members of the panel.
thank you all for being here today. I introduced a resolution calling for this subject matter
hearing because despite two community meetings and extensive media coverage, there remain many
unanswered questions about what's being proposed by Amtrak and White Sox minority owner Justin
Ishbia and his company Shore Capital and Canal Edge that would have a massive impact on my ward.
To summarize, Amtrak has received approximately $700 million in federal grant funding to build
this facility and to make related improvements to the viaducts between 22nd Street and Pershing
Road along Canal Street. Amtrak is developing this project in partnership with Canal Edge LLC,
a corporation owned by Shore Capital. A separate Shore Capital-led entity, City River Holdings,
has applied for a $1.8 billion loan for future development of the 14th Street Yard, which they
currently have under contract to purchase. I want to make something clear up front. I fully support
and welcome federal investment in our transportation infrastructure,
especially at a time when this federal government has seen fit to choke off federal funds from this state and from this city.
It is a needed and important improvement, but this is not simply a relocation of rail maintenance operations.
It appears to be enabling the first step of a much larger private real estate transaction,
financed substantially by federal taxpayer dollars.
Just to remind everybody, we are also federal taxpayers.
Thank you.
The sheer size and scale of this facility cannot be overstated.
As proposed, it would be large enough to service nine trains at once and rise four stories high,
operating around the clock at 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
A facility of this magnitude would fundamentally and permanently change the physical landscape of the residential community of the 11th Ward,
which would be situated including a Chicago public school that is within 586 feet from the proposed structure,
a historically landmark park in Armour Square Park located even closer at 413 feet away from the proposed maintenance building.
Its constant operations would have a devastating negative impact on residential property values,
would foreclose future development opportunities on and around the site,
and would significantly diminish the overall quality of life for the families who call this community home.
I'm one of them.
This project is also part of a plan to move the Chicago White Sox away from the 11th Ward
at the cost of a civic and economic anchor this community has held for generations,
and to be exact, 116 years.
To my colleagues here today, I ask you to consider how your community would react to such a proposal
to build something akin to this in the center of a residential community.
And just for your reference, the length of this yard would be approximately North Avenue to Irving Park.
Just imagine that on the north side.
And then I want you to imagine how they would react to being informed that due to what is called a categorical exclusion,
they aren't required to provide an independent environmental impact study.
Amtrak has conceded, and amid our outrage, they will provide and publish a study.
We are still waiting for that, though.
Now, a moment for the 2026 American League Division Series Championship White Sox.
The White Sox have called Bridgeport home for 116 years.
Generations of us have grown up walking to the ballpark from surrounding neighborhoods of Chinatown,
Armor Square and Bridgeport with our kids, with our families, with our grandparents.
And many of our residents work in the ballpark.
Working class residents have spent their hard-earned money on season tickets,
merchandise, concessions, and year after year in support of this team.
Rate Field is just 35 years old and was built with $137 million in taxpayer subsidies.
It has plenty more life to give.
We must modernize Sox Park and the surrounding area,
and we stand ready to work with this team to present a comprehensive plan to that effect.
Finally, Mr. Ishvia has said that this plan would be fully privately financed,
And with all due respect, I would encourage this body to be skeptical of that claim.
Canal Edge comes to the city council.
If Canal Edge comes to the city council in building, sorry, I'm reading this all wrong,
comes to the city council to ask for tax breaks and TIF dollars in support of this plan,
I will urge my colleagues to look at it with a critical eye and ask many questions,
as $1.8 billion in federal loans is taxpayer dollars.
I thank the community for coming out today, and I thank my colleagues in the city council for giving us the opportunity to sound the alarm and to, again, seek transparency and accountability from Amtrak and its partners.
Can I ask questions now or later?
Pearman?
Well, yeah, if you want to start asking questions, go ahead.
I would love to start by asking a couple.
And just because we had the presentation, a couple of things popped in my mind.
And I'll let my colleagues who actually sit on this committee ask the questions.
And I would love to close as well, if that's okay.
One of the things that was on a slide earlier in the presentation said that regarding the 14th Street Yard
and why it's not a viable option because it cannot, what did it say,
it cannot be done without severe service disruption and higher costs.
On behalf of my community, I'd like to say that the disruption to the lives of the 6,741 residents
who live within 500 feet, just 500 feet, would be severely disrupted.
and it's not going to come at higher monetary costs.
In fact, it's going to cost us value in properties in and around the area.
Can you tell me, can someone from Amtrak tell me when Amtrak's plans changed
for the Canal Street yard, moving from it being a storage facility
to an actual maintenance facility moving from 14th Street?
Is it Canal Street?
Yeah, I can answer that question.
So as far as prior to responding, what is that?
Please state your names.
Oh, yes.
Stephen Sagerland from Amtrak.
As in the planning and design of any project, we are constantly working on the scope of a project.
And when some of the documents that have been published talked about storage and the wording in some of these documents gets very truncated,
to not be fully inclusive to all of the elements of a yard.
So we have been for some time talking about the needs and what those needs are
and studying alternatives.
And as we move forward through the process is the project scope that you see presented today.
So you can't point to an actual time when that changed.
So I'm going to assume you're telling me that it's always been in the plan to have it be a maintenance yard?
So many people call our 14th Street yard a storage yard, but it also has maintenance functions within it as well.
So this is about the definition of the words that are used, which is why in the process that for the federal government to review the NEPA study,
we have to provide the detailed specifics of the project in full and not truncation.
And so that is what we have presented in that review process.
And have to your comment earlier about the requested release, as we've mentioned previously,
we're engaging with FRA on that process and trying to have that happen as soon as possible.
Are there not documents that you can provide that you sent to the FRA for the application
that are in your possession today that you can just share?
Those documents we did submit to the FRA.
We can coordinate with them on the process for them to be released.
The process for a grant application is the federal's process, and so we can discuss with them that request.
Yeah, I believe that there's information that you have engaged the environmental review company for that you should be able to provide because the content was used to complete the application.
Are there reports or studies that were used to complete the application that you can just share?
They're not, because Amtrak is also owned by the USDOT, and so we do have to coordinate these actions with them.
Okay.
I get that we're not going to get this answer, and we're going to continue to count the days until we get this report.
In your timeline on the website, and in our conversations, Amtrak has referenced conversations around this yard going as far back as 2023,
and you point to a 2023 report of the state of Illinois' rail summary.
That report, when you look at it, and you use this great function called Control-F, it's a 210-page document,
you find one bullet point the bullet point says in respect to canal yard and this is not a summary
document so i can appreciate things being truncated this is a 210 page report there was
plenty of room to detail out what your plans were here and what it says is that the illinois state
rail plan lists buying the canal street yards to quote provide storage space for equipment needed
for future services. That's all that says. One mention in 210 pages. And I'm going to also pick
up where Dr. Lowe said and will take issue specifically with the referral of the continuous
use of Canal Yard as a rail yard. In fact, I have a letter here from the CEO of Union Pacific
where he states and i quote the former canal street yard has supported railroad operations
for many years as union pacific's railroad operational needs have evolved that property
is no longer required for freight rail operations and we're evaluating a potential sale as a surplus
asset the company that owns it has not operated as a rail operation since 2019 that hasn't been
continuous use. Audermon Lee, may I address that topic? So my name is Crystal Zorbaugh. I'm with
Mullins. I was part of the environmental team and the project grant team. So what you just read in
the terms of the Union Pacific letter, they said that the former yard, because they stopped using
that yard in August of this year, the former is new. The former is not to 2019. And on the Midwest
maintenance facility website
We show pictures of them storing and using the yard for railroad purposes from 2019 to 2026.
The summary reports that you've shown on your website and that you've presented to our community compare previous conditions to what future conditions would be,
which completely ignore what the status quo is of what we experience today.
That is a fact, and that does not provide for us what, as residents, will be the impact of this yard, and we continue to wait for that.
Every time you all have come before the community and your community meetings, we've gotten a little bit more information.
That seems to be how we're to receive it.
But can you provide for us the full application to the FRA for the grant that was provided?
I think I mentioned that on the prior response,
that we can coordinate with FRA on asking for that to be released.
By when do you think we will be able to get that?
I will have to speak with them to discuss that process.
Stephen, may I also add that while the public can request it via the FOIA request,
ultimately you can ask for the application, and they may give it to you without the FOIA request.
So if you make that request to the FRA, you might get it quicker for the grant application,
the 25-page grant application.
Using a point of clarification, Chairman Vasquez.
Thank you, Chairman.
I appreciate the answer.
My question is, is there anything that impedes Amtrak from providing the information that was provided in the application?
Did the federal government say once you apply, you can't share that information on your own, or is that something you have to ask permission to the federal government for?
So Amtrak, like the FRA, because we are owned by USDOT, we both have a FOIA process.
We have received FOIA requests, and so that we do have a process for reviewing and evaluating what can be published.
and we are working through those requests that have been received.
Yeah, my question wasn't if there's a process.
Is there a willingness and opportunity and ability for you all to just give it
independent of the process?
Again, because Amtrak is owned by USDOT, we do have to coordinate with our partners.
Yeah, it's like an answer, no question.
So let me see if I can.
So did you guys sign anything like an NDA that precludes you from sharing information
that you included on the process, the application process?
No, we did not sign any NDAs, but it is a process for requesting the release of information that we have.
And so that is something that we can take back, as we've been saying, for all of these questions, and we can provide a response.
Yeah, that's a non-answer, but we can keep going.
Yeah, and I promise I'll ask like two or three more questions and we'll move on to my colleagues.
As I said, we've been getting information sort of metered out here.
And I understand now that this has been in the works for much longer because you say it's not just storage.
Storage actually means maintenance as well.
So if I take it at face value and there have been plans in the works for the canal yard to be the future home of the Midwest maintenance facility,
why haven't we seen more detailed plans?
The first time we had a community meeting, it was color blocks on a Google map.
The second time, there were more detailed maps, which I appreciate.
And then, you know, that's when you showed us exactly where you were going to place fuel tanks and catch basins and the like.
I'm just wondering if the next time we see you again, if there's going to be more added to it, because we seem to not get consistent information.
At what stage are you in the design and finalizing the design of the proposed site?
yeah i can talk about some of the questions may ask the team for some others but
like all projects funded with federal grants that there is a progression of understanding what is
the funds that may be available how much matching sources can be raised that are necessary to
complement the grant award and that impacts the final scope of any project and so it does evolve
And even between an application and an award, there sometimes are some changes based on funding availability in that award.
Additionally, as we go through the NEPA process, if there are items that are identified to be mitigations in that process, the project needs to address those mitigations.
And so you are correct to highlight that there is an evolution and progression of the design and that even in the design as we are working on it, it starts at a very high level.
And then as we start getting the, you know, 30 percent, et cetera, designs advanced, that the clarity of specifically what and where starts to appear like what you've seen on the screen.
And we have been working on that since the grant announcement.
And that is why you're seeing more and more.
I don't know if Crystal or Adam, if you want to share any additional comments on the kind of progression of these points.
A point of information before that, Autumn Gutierrez.
Thank you, Chairman.
And I have a bunch of other questions, but for now, I'm just curious, because we would be jumping back and forth from these.
I just want to make sure that we ask if the $640 million Federal Railroad Administration grant funds can be used in another site in the city of Chicago.
No, actually, I'll take that one.
And so whenever you apply for a federal grant, it's specific to the project site and the project scope, and there is a statement of work.
They consider the NEPA analysis for that project only, and once that's awarded, they're competing against other projects at other states.
So for fairness and competitive funding and contracting, a grant award is specific to a location and a project scope, and it is not interchangeable amongst other locations within the same state.
Thank you for the answer. Just about fairness, I don't think it's fair for that community to be part of these discussions when this big project is coming to the 11th Ward, as well as not having the opportunity to meet and disclose, having a transparent process with our other women and our community here in the city of Chicago.
I'll make my other questions in a minute. Thank you.
Okay. Members of the panel, prior to responding to any questions, please state your name.
Apologies.
No problem. For the record, please state your name.
Oh, now, Crystal Zorbaugh. I'm with Mullins.
So sorry. I didn't realize I had to do it every time I spoke.
It's for the transcription.
Okay.
One last question.
I'll let my colleagues ask their questions.
I know that the categorical exclusion was sought and awarded.
Is there anything that would stop Amtrak from just conducting its own voluntary environmental impact study?
in the interest of creating trust with the community.
Hi, I'm Crystal Zorbo with Mellons, and I'd like to answer that question.
So when you apply for federal funding, you agree to be bound by the federal NEPA process.
If Amtrak does its own study, it would be conflicting jurisdiction
because would that study be done under Illinois' law, or would it be done under federal law?
and the federal supremacy clause of the Constitution preserves to the federal government
the right to regulate transportation decisions because a decision in Amtrak does not just affect
the city of Chicago, but it affects connecting service across 16 routes that extend in and out
of Chicago. So with respect to doing its own environmental study, we did all of the studies
that were required under federal law, and to do a study Amtrak to independently undertake a state
study under its own resources would result in the same study because we can't have two different
studies, one which considers state law and one which considers federal law because there's conflict
into the authorities, and then nothing would ever get done. I love that answer. Not really.
What about Canal Edge or any part of the development joint ventures?
So continuing with my answer, that Canal Edge, as the developer, worked with Amtrak to produce the study, to provide the information.
Myself and Susanna Campbell, with whose vacant farmer workman, worked on those individual studies.
So this was a collaborative effort.
And we have already had a study that documented the 12 required resource areas.
I appreciate that you are a very experienced person in your field as well.
I'm looking at your website now where under experience, and this is what I'll end on.
In addition, quote, our team is extremely familiar with developing categorical exclusions and findings of no significant impact, F-O-N-S-I.
So you're really good at what you do.
Thank you.
Right.
Okay.
Okay. So for members of the committee, I'm going to start off with three questions, and if we need a piece, and if we need a round two, we'll do that. So first line of question comes from Vice Chair Vasquez.
Thank you. I mean, a lot of it to me is similar along the questions that have been asked. I think, can you put the timeline slide back up? And the reason I have a lot of questions is for entities as large as the landowner, Amtrak, the federal government, to get to the point where there's some level of conversation and planning takes a lot of time.
And yet our neighbors here didn't get a lot of time to actually have the conversation once those decisions were made.
And so I'm really curious how this all actually played out.
So 2023, it's identified as an acquisition target.
What was the intent there first when it was acquired?
Yeah.
And for us to begin those conversations, there's a number of steps we have to go through in the federal process, including doing some of that preliminary environmental work and also discussing the value of the property in order to enter into a conversation with a prospective seller if they are willing to sell.
And so that work takes time. And in the conversations, once we began them, it took time because...
So that was 2023?
Well, beyond 2023. This work takes years.
Meaning prior to?
No, beyond 2023 is when that work began to pick up, to be performed, to prepare ourselves for conversations with...
Like I'm a next year old because the answer is a little funny.
Yeah. Twenty twenty three is when the decision was made. Hey, we want to endeavor in acquiring this and then engage in a federal process.
Yes. OK, so that started there. Now, there is an intent as to what the acquisition was for when those conversations occurred.
It appears that you want to call evolution. It ultimately changed what you guys wanted to do, begin with to then what is now being proposed.
Is that correct?
Like I mentioned, Stephen Sagerlin from Amtrak, in any project, you have to scope the project based on the anticipated funds that you expect to get through the federal process.
And so our project had to evaluate what capital we thought we could raise, the matching funds that we could bring to complement that, and the scope has to fit that amount.
So when I talk about that progression and definition of the scope, it's through that process.
So basically you're like, we got a certain amount of money, but hey, we got more.
Let's change plans now.
I mean, that's the evolution, right?
Can I back up for just a minute?
Because the question you asked is slightly more nuanced than the question that he answered.
My name is Kristen Dorval with Mullen's Law.
Hold on a second.
No name.
So you were talking about the 2023 state.
I did.
No, here's my general question is this.
If I'm a city council member, so I can make it clear for everybody here.
If I'm a city council member and I'm the one representing our neighbors and I don't find out about information until well after it's been discussed by multiple large parties who take their own months to discuss this thing.
Yeah, I'm going to have a problem like anybody else would, because there was no point at which the colleague was brought in at the front end to even have the conversation.
And those decisions were made and evolved and more money came and decisions were changed.
None of that was at any point something where our colleague was involved in that conversation.
Am I correct on that part?
We did have some conversations, Stephen Segeland from Amtrak, with the alderwoman at some points in time between 2023 and today.
I'm sure that occurred.
When did that start?
Was it 2023 or was it 2026?
That's still in between.
I believe the earliest conversation was 2024.
okay and in in that 2024 conversation was what you presented what ends up right now being uh
proposed we didn't have this much definition in the design because we didn't have answer no
super simple okay crystal zorba again with mullins
To answer your question, I just want to take a step back.
The 2023 study was actually a draft study in 21 and 22 where the state of Illinois looked at this.
They looked at solutions on a global level and a specific level.
Arterwoman Lee is absolutely correct that there was one page that specifically discussed the Canal Straight Yard,
but they also discussed the needs to improve transportation solutions for passenger infrastructure
and operations throughout Illinois and other pages in generality.
What Stephen is saying here is that that first study came in 2023.
For those of you who don't know, there's two different types of rail yards.
There's 10901 rail operations and there's 10906 rail operations.
Those numbers will not mean anything to you, and I don't expect them to.
But let me tell you what the difference between the two is.
10901 is when a freight train provides freight-to-freight service between point A and point B.
10906 is considered ancillary, team track, support track operations.
That operations can include a lot of things.
It can include storage.
It can include maintenance.
It is an evolving concept.
So in 2023, when they put it into the state rail plan, it didn't narrow it to any specific ancillary supporting activity for transportation.
I appreciate the context.
I don't need it.
The question I have is simple.
If the process, if the plan itself evolved, was there communication about its evolution and changes up until the point that was before August of this year?
Yes, sir, there was.
And we have documents with that communication.
Can you, through the chair, show us what those conversations were with Audre Person Lee related to all those evolutions next to all the evolutions that occurred to make sure that at every stage she was brought in and had the conversation?
So federal transportation law is not necessarily a state level.
There were conversations.
I'm going to ask you, sorry, my question, you guys keep answering a different question than what I'm asking.
I understand there are rules in places.
What I'm asking you all to do is to provide through the chair what conversations you have with Alderperson Lee and how that relates to the changes you all discussed as an organization.
And if you guys have that, it's a yes or no.
Okay, so we will provide that information.
Thank you.
I'm glad I got an answer there.
You're welcome.
I would just make this point because I don't have time and it's only three questions.
If anyone here in this city believes that you're going to trust this current federal government when it relates to environmental protections, you're mistaken.
And I say that there might have been people who voted for Donald Trump.
Trust he doesn't care about the environment in Chicago.
So when people are asking for independent studies, it's not about one jurisdiction or the other.
It's because we don't know the facts and we don't trust them from the federal government.
So asking for you all to provide them isn't about a conflict.
It's about the fact that the neighbors who are going to have to live across the street from this thing want to know what those impacts are because we have a city that has history of not giving a damn until somebody gets cancer decades later.
And so when we're asking for a legislation to get cumulative impact studies, that's what's important.
So I get that you guys are concerned.
Thank you.
I guess that you guys are concerned about your – not just the bottom dollar.
There's clearly a value in transportation and getting goods across.
It's important as well as the union jobs and all that is important.
But so are the lives of the people that are going to be most impacted because they live there and they're kids.
And so at the very least, you should have the respect for that enough to provide the information and not just tell us, hey, there's a process.
When you have the information, because you guys did the studies.
So I would highly compel you all, as they've been doing in the few meetings they've been able to talk to you all in, to actually provide that information.
Because then we wouldn't be here with this level of temperature towards what you guys are providing as answers because they're barely answers.
Thank you, Chairman.
Thank you. So, Audermon Hopkins.
Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chairman. In order to formalize the request from our vice chairman, and then I do have three questions. I appreciate it.
But let's submit from the chair a formal request to the team for not just the analysis of the study work that was done by the FRA, but the technical analysis and the field data that went into it within each of the 12 areas of emphasis for the environmental work that was done.
The enabling legislation for this meeting, as Alderman Lee submitted, says there was no environmental study.
And we've just spent the last 30 minutes talking about environmental studies that were, in fact, done.
So the credibility of the study.
The question of whether it is independent or not, whether it was a paid effort to achieve a predetermined conclusion or not, we can't make that determination without anything in front of us right now.
And it's highly unusual to have a subject matter hearing where the documents related to that subject have not been provided to us.
So, Mr. Chairman, if you would please make that formal request, whether it needs to be a FOIA or not should be irrelevant.
It is from one public body to another, from one government agency to another.
We're entitled to this information, and we should get it.
So, Mr. Chairman, thank you for submitting that as part of this committee's proceedings.
I do have three questions.
The first is regarding the involvement of the Surface Transportation Board.
Do they have any role to play in the analysis of this project?
And if so, could you describe it?
If they are not, in fact, involved, could you explain why not?
so crystals are brought from mullins i will say that the the actual construction of the
maintenance facility it is an active rail yard the only way a rail yard becomes inactive is if
you get abandonment authority from the surface transportation board that has never been sought
here so there is no regulatory proceeding that the stb would take in the development of this yard
into an actual maintenance yard there might be other roles that they play in ancillary proceedings
But the actual construction of the maintenance yard is something that gets approved by the Federal Railroad Administration and then ultimately carried out by Amtrak.
So the determination, whether it's inactive versus active, there has to be a formal declaration.
It isn't just common sense.
If nothing's happening there, it's considered inactive.
So there's lots and lots of STV precedent on this.
And actually, there was a case in California with somewhat similar facts called Mendocino Railway,
where the community came and suggested that a rail yard that was lightly used or hadn't been used for freight purpose in a number of years was no longer an active rail yard.
And in late last year, the Surface Transportation Board issued a decision that said once a rail yard is authorized as a rail yard,
It continues to exist and operate as a rail yard until abandonment authority is sought, and we extinguish those rights.
No abandonment authority has been sought here.
Okay.
Does the application submitted, the Federal-State Partnership application submitted by Amtrak to the FRA, does it address at any point, does it talk about a White Sox stadium?
No, the application does not talk about White Sox.
Stephen Seglin from Amtrak. The application does not talk about a White Sox stadium.
And I also want to mention on your prior comment about the environmental studies being released prior to this meeting,
as we had mentioned in the coordination of this meeting, that while it's not published yet,
we are offering to come back when it's published and do that walk through the specific details you've mentioned.
Okay. And my final question is, can you describe the impact, both current conditions and if this project happens, what is the impact on the St. Charles Airline Bridge?
So the maintenance facility project is at Canal Street Yard. It is not at the 14th Street Yard. So this project has no impact to the St. Charles Airline Bridge.
Including if this project were to come to fruition
It would have no impact on the St. Charles Airline Bridge
The maintenance facility project, yes
Okay, does not
Claire, did you get your answer?
Yeah, thank you
I'm sorry, Alderman Dow, did you
Okay, one of the information
Alderman Lee
Thank you
Just for everybody that's in the room
The St. Charles Airline Bridge, can someone say what that is?
Crystal Zorbaugh, Mellon's Law Group, that is a bridge at the current 14th Street Yard,
and this project is being constructed on the Canal Street Yard.
So there are two different areas within the city of Chicago.
How is the bridge utilized today?
I'm sorry?
How is the bridge utilized today?
Well, there's actually two St. Charles Airline bridges.
One of them is used for active freight service, and the other is currently out of service.
What's the name of the bridge?
I'm sorry.
I promise this is just for clarification.
The bridge that crosses the Chicago River, what's the name of that bridge?
South Branch Bridge, is that what you're referring to?
I want to make sure everybody understands the couple of bridges that we're talking about.
Thanks for the question.
I'm done.
Thank you.
I'm done, too.
Okay.
I don't know, Rodriguez, is he still around?
Alderman Conway.
Appreciate you all willing to come back when the environmental reports are issued.
So I'll share that, and I won't belabor this because we can do it when the reports are issued,
but certainly had concerns about the mentioning that the soil problems could be managed in that.
But when the reports come out, I look forward to hearing more about that.
A quick one being, is the $87 million to fix the viaducts, is that part of the big grants?
There's $87 million as part of the 600.
And the reason I ask, because a news website, trains.com, a prominent news website, I'm sure, seems to indicate that the $87 million to fix the viaducts may be a separate grant from the railroad grant.
And I definitely know the viaducts there are in rough shape.
So just wanted to get some clarity on that.
Crystal Zorbaugh from Mullins Law Group, thank you for your question.
There are actually two FSP National Grants, one for the maintenance facility project, one for the related viaducts improvements project.
So they are, in fact, separate grants.
So to the extent that you see that portrayed, that is why, because they are, in fact, two separate grants that are part of a larger project at the Canal Street Yard.
Great. Okay. And perhaps you can speak more about, I mean, talk to Agnauseum about how this is already a rail yard mentioned.
that there was previously 150,000 annual lifts there.
Perhaps you could speak a little bit more about how will activity at the new yard change
once this project is completed.
When you mean how the activity will – Stephen Sutherland from Amtrak – when you say activity
will change, like what are the freight activities that they have performed at the yard versus
Amtrak's activities? Yeah, so train activity, and perhaps you'd want to touch on environmental
activity too. Yeah, so as I described in the day of life of a train, the train, when it comes to
the yard, we will clean it, and then we will bring it to the maintenance facility, which we call the
train shed, which is a building that in the inside is going to have a pit underneath the train so we
can do those maintenance activities, check the wheels, brake pads, etc. There will be an overhead
crane inside of the building in case we need to switch out, an air conditioning unit that might
be broken, and then there will be the cleaning functions on the interior of the train, restocking
of the train's cafe, car, bathrooms, water, etc. And then after those maintenance and servicing
functions, the train will then go to the storage
tracts, which we highlighted are on the north side of the yard
and wait until they need to head to Chicago.
How does all of that contrast with what happens there now?
Do you want to discuss the historic use?
Crystal Zorbaugh Mullins.
What happened in August when it was decommissioned, I guess, from part of that.
If you look on our website at
into a maintenance facility.com there were a lot of trains being stored there um there were tractor
trailers being stored there it was an active rail yard but it was more used for storage purposes
and at the time of august when it stopped doing that and up moved its trains off the property
so in 2019 it was this large intermodal facility which would have been much more extensive than
what it will be as an Amtrak maintenance facility. And once it's an Amtrak maintenance facility,
it will be a lesser footprint in terms of operations because many of the things that
they conduct will be indoors. And so you won't see them being conducted in the environmental
footprint will be different because it's indoor versus outdoor activity. But to go to your
question, and I think what you're trying to ask is, it was the height of activity in 2019,
And then there was decreased activity and there will be increased activity with the maintenance facility, but will be a lesser footprint because it's passenger operations versus freight operations.
So it's your.
Assertion that there will be lesser activity once it's completed than there was in 2019.
I know activity is kind of a vague term.
But if the Amtrak Maintenance Facility was not to transition there, the alternative is not necessarily no rail operations because no abandonment authority has been sought.
UP could go back to using it for full freight operations and there would be no SDV jurisdiction or any other jurisdiction required to presume its former activities.
and um pivoting off that um is my is my third question and i'll answer ask in a compound way
to make sure i maintain your thing what um other than 14th street and canal street were there other
sites considered and with that in mind who made the decision to uh to choose this site was it the
the FRA, Amtrak, Ishbia, the White House. I mean, who made that that final decision?
Yeah, those locations that I mentioned are the primary locations that we looked at,
Steven Segerland from Amtrak. And the decision was with the Amtrak leadership,
the Amtrak board, FRA and USGOT.
So but was there any other was there any other sites considered besides for a recognizer's unique things?
Was there any other sites?
Those are the primary sites that more time was looked at.
Obviously, Chicago has lots of rail yards, small and big and different and farther and farther, near and farther away.
So those were the sites that we looked at in detail.
And Crystal Zorbo from Mullins Law Group, you have to understand, going back to something that Stephen said in his presentation, it's not a one-size-fits-all solution.
So certain sites were excluded simply because it would not be suitable and could not fit the operations as proposed to be conducted by Amtrak.
So that limited your pool.
Was there another suitable site in the greater Chicago area?
In the beginning of a scan, you're looking at every single rail yard that is available in the city of Chicago, Stephen Segerland from Amtrak.
And so all of them are initially screened before you're looking at which ones start to meet that list of criteria that we highlighted and then to start spending more time doing due diligence on those opportunities and estimating plans and costs and operational challenges.
So those three sites that remain in place, Global One and Canal Street,
are the ones that went to that level of detail.
Okay.
And fair to say that those are the three sites that survived the screening process?
Yeah.
Okay.
And you said Amtrak made the decision.
All right, Mr. Chairman, I don't at this point need round two.
I look forward to watching the rest of the hearing.
If I change my mind, I'll come tap you on the shoulder.
But thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your indulgence into the committee and the members in the box for answering the questions.
All right.
Thank you.
And I look forward to hearing more in the studies come out.
Likewise.
Autumn and Gutierrez, would you?
Thank you, Chairman.
And thank you all for being here.
And I think it's the first time you've all been into a hearing in City Council.
I'm sorry for the procedures that we have, but it's just for transparency.
Just to make it clear for everybody, because I think also people here, welcome to City
Council and City Hall, neighbors of the 11th Ward.
I now visit more often your ward since also my girls go to school there.
So just for full transparency and record, I want to thank you all for being here.
But also, I think we also need to remember that we are in 2026 with this new wave of
Alderman that we also started a few years back, right, where we tend to do things differently,
where we tend to always approach things differently. We now make sure that our neighbors
know what is happening around them. And unfortunately, speaking on my ward in the 14th
ward, and I always mention this, decisions were made at closed doors without no community input.
And what I've seen here is that, of course, and I understand as a workforce development vice chair in a union home, that, of course, we want to make sure that our employees are working in a safe site.
We want to make sure that development happens in our city of Chicago.
But we also want to make sure that the community is in the forefront of every single project that comes to our wards.
And for me,
It just gave me the chills and it gave me a little bit, I don't even know what to say,
but it just takes a ton to just realize how this big of a project,
how these millions of dollars coming to our communities are just being made again.
These decisions have been made in closed doors.
These decisions have been made by right, as we can tell with your presentation, but unfortunately, there has not been collaboration with any other levels of government.
But the most important thing, and I mentioned already, the community has not been in the forefront of these decisions or these changes.
So, again, I just want to reiterate and echo what my colleague, Andrea Vazquez, mentioned.
And, again, to my point, people need to understand that coming to the city of Chicago or making changes or developing in the city of Chicago now in these years and with these new aldermen that we now sit in these positions,
we are going to continue to make sure that things are transparent, that all the processes are done by right,
but also now people know that when they come and testify and are here for a hearing,
that they need to even identify themselves every single time they speak for the record.
They need to identify themselves for full transparency.
And because there's people watching, right, these hearings, and they don't know about it.
They don't know who's speaking.
They were not watching the beginning of the hearing, so they don't know who is testifying, for example.
But also, there's people from the 77 communities of the city of Chicago that are also interested at the well-being of our city.
So I want to thank you, Other Woman Lee, your office and your community for standing up for them.
As I said, I want to thank you all for being here and continue to voice your opinions.
But also, I want to make sure, and as I said, as a Workforce Development Vice Chair, that, of course, union jobs are coming to our communities, but that they do the process right.
and that they continue to address all of our questions
and they don't just move forward with the project
without proving and sending us all the information that we're requesting
because, of course, we're waiting a lot of those questions through the chair
and we'll be receiving a lot of that information with you all.
And with that said, I'm just looking forward for more information to come,
for more transparency and for the data and those results of everything that you're doing and working.
Because at this point, I don't feel like, and I had those questions pull up,
because I don't even think those questions have been addressed.
So if you can please provide through the chair the answers to every single one of those questions,
because as you noted, those are questions that the community have.
And I don't think that right now with your presentation, not even those questions were addressed.
Thank you.
Thank you, Alderman.
Alderman Harris.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
My question's about the phases.
Am I correct that there are multiple phases in this project?
Stephen Sagerlin from Amtrak, there are not multiple phases in this project.
It is one construction, one phase.
Now, the period of time of construction of the scope that we showed on the screen today, there may be construction on the site at different points at different times of the duration, but I can ask some of my team members if we have any other comments about phasing, but that would be within the construction of the scope.
So this is one entire project over multiple blocks to be done simultaneously.
So you'll start working from one end of the project to the other end of the project simultaneously.
I believe the construction plans, Stephen Segeland from Amtrak, are not fully formed to determine how the sequencing of construction will work.
Right now, they're working on the advancement of the design so they can get to the point with the construction teams and our general contractor on that construction scheduling and sequencing.
And correct me if I'm wrong, did you all mention that the $700 million grant that you receive, what happens if that is not enough to complete it?
So in any federal grant, Stephen Zuckerland from Amtrak, the expectation of the recipient of the grant, if there are cost overruns, that the recipient has to find a way to complete that project.
And so that is what Amtrak, as part of signing up for the obligation, is working through.
And since there were two grants, so is this amount inclusive of the VIDOC repairs, the $700 million?
Steven Zegelin from Amtrak said there are two grants, and the federal contribution on the first grant,
which is for the maintenance facility, the train shed, the track work that we saw, that is $572 million.
And then the federal contribution on the second grant that we mentioned is, Crystal, is $87 million, and that is for the viaduct work.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
All right.
One second, Alderman down.
Alderman Moore.
Thank you, Chairman.
Just a couple of questions.
that's a park
like it is basically a park area. Has Friends of the Park
expressed any concerns about this?
Can you repeat your question please? Crystal Zorbaugh from Mullins.
I say Friends of the Park. Did they express any concerns about this project?
Steven Seglin from Amtrak. I'm not aware
but we can confirm that.
I'm not aware of any correspondence neither.
Okay.
Point of information.
I can actually respond to that.
Alderman Moore, I believe that Friends of the Park did file a letter or send a letter to Amtrak opposing their plans.
I can get a copy of that letter to you through the chair.
Okay.
But you all don't have it?
Crystal Zorbaugh from Mullins.
They may have filed it with the federal government or the DOT, but I did not receive it, and I don't believe Stephen did neither.
And Amtrak, we have, Stephen Segeland from Amtrak, we have received a number of inquiries as well as FOIA requests.
And so there is a team at Amtrak that responds to all of that correspondence.
And so we can connect with that team in order to confirm that request, if that was received.
Yeah, and if you could provide to the chair so you can get through, I can understand the response that you all had to friends at the park.
And I know this was a lot.
So Canal Edge, right, is the development company, right?
What are their responsibilities, financial interests, compensation, and contractual obligations to this project?
Eric Lynn with Canal Edge. Thank you for the question, Alderman. So Canal Edge is the
development partner on the private side of this public-private partnership along with Amtrak.
Amtrak has applied for the grant and received the FSP grant that you've heard. Once that grant
is received by Amtrak, Canal Edge will work together with them and the construction team
to ensure that the development gets completed, and then Amtrak will then pay using their grant
to the construction team and to Canal Edge. To your second question, Alderman, about what
compensation Canal Edge will receive, I want to state very clearly that Canal Edge first saw the
opportunity from Amtrak when they put up the 14th Street yard as an opportunity for private
purchase and we have subsequently reached a contract with them to purchase that yard should
this go forward and also to partner on this project with them. But when we did so, as opposed
to other development companies that were looking for profit or a percentage to gain profit upon
building this, Canal Edge has sought no profit or personal payment for working with Amtrak on this
project uh...
on the development
Okay. Now, for me, it's not so much as part of the situation with working with the community, making sure that my frustration is more internal with the, I guess, with the White Sox, if you will.
And that's, you know, when that rate field was built, and of course we had public housing around there at that time, and still some areas that it was supposed to be a focus, sort of like what Wrigleyville was, to have development and something going on to spur economic development in that community.
That never happened. And I guess my frustration is in communities where we need development and where we need this spark, people tend to put the things like railroads and other things there that people may not need for that community.
We're looking to build up the South Side in a very positive manner.
And I think this, I just can't see that this is very positive for that community.
I'm hoping you all will work with the community and work with the local elected official to make sure that it's something that the community wants.
If they feel negatively impacted, and then I really think you all should reconsider doing this project.
But Katina worked with the alder person on here.
She knows her community better than anyone, and I'm just hoping we can come to some resolution.
Thank you, Chairman.
Eric Lynn Connellage, thank you, Alderman, for your comment.
I do want to make very clear that this project we're speaking about here today is the Amtrak modernization of their maintenance yard moving to Canal Street.
And it is a separate project from the Chicago White Sox or any future movement for the Chicago White Sox.
And as it relates to the Chicago White Sox decisions about where the stadium will be or won't be in the future,
the controlling owner of the Chicago White Sox is still Jerry Reistorf, and the decision remains with him.
But to your final point of working with the local aldermen and with the city council writ large, we look forward to doing that.
And some questions earlier to include Alderman Gutierrez's question about whether we have worked with the local alderman.
I want to make sure that we can state for the record that once Canal Edge became a part of this project and the public-private partnership with Amtrak,
We sought out meetings with Alderman Lee, as well as with Commissioner Daley on the county commission and wanted to be as transparent as possible about this project.
And we will continue to do so going forward. Thank you, sir.
No, thank you. Thank you for your response. Thank you, Chairman.
All right. Now I will move to non-members. Alderman Dow.
Oh, Scott, I apologize.
Sorry, one more.
One more, I just think.
Thank you, Chairman.
Just had a few questions here, if I could.
What does Canal Edge receive for its $125 million investment?
Is there a specific agreement or an option that exists on this land swap?
Eric Lynn, Canal Edge, thank you for the question, Alderman.
I would not characterize this as a land swap, although this is an agreement that was reached with Amtrak to be their public-private partnership development partner with the modernizing of their maintenance yard, the Canal Street yard.
And as I stated earlier to Alderman Moore's question, Canal Edge is not seeking any profit for that partnership.
However, at the same time, what Canal Edge has done and moved forward with Amtrak on is reached a contract for the 14th Street rail yard for a future purchase.
And obviously, that would be a beneficial economic benefit, both for the city of Chicago and for the parties involved.
um so going over to this uh the grants again um is there any city or state money that's been
requested specifically state matching funds or any kind of other funds on this project
no on this uh crystals are ball with melin's law group
I don't know.
On this project, there are only two contributing partners.
There is the matching funds, which will be provided to the project that are not state or local matching funds.
And then there is the federal component for the project.
Okay.
Have you estimated, and I'm sure we could if we needed to, the annual loss to the local taxing districts,
including our schools once the yard is Amtrak-owned and tax-exempt?
Um, Stephen Sagerlin from Amtrak. So a freight rail yards are taxed in a different way. They're
not taxed through the city, um, property tax system. They are taxed at the state level based
on the business performance of their company. And then the state appropriates those funds,
um downward so there is no um current taxes that is paid by the the freight property so it
it would be a tax-exempt property though right now it is not tax it's not a test a tax by the
city of chicago it is at the state level okay um but if it's amtrak owned um that's not freight
is it you're classified as freight or you're classified as passenger we're not classified
as freight we're passenger rail and amtrak also is exempt from local taxes so it would be the
same situation so when you were talking earlier about bringing um i don't know revenue to the
city and some people have i've heard that comment several times what actual revenue does the city
get out of out of this so amtrak's activities not specifically from that but if there is a change
in use of any property that we sell or lease then that is something that is would change that
condition so otherwise there's no taxes that really inured to the city at all in this project
Eric Lynn, Canal Edge. I think, as was stated earlier, there is an $87 million grant separate from the maintenance facility yard grant that is provided by the federal government to improve and repair 17 viaducts in this area.
These viaducts have been falling apart for years. They are dangerous.
We receive messages, and I know many aldermen's offices do as well, about the danger of walking underneath the viaducts.
I personally walked underneath them and seen two women coming out of a store and walked on the opposite side of the street so they didn't have to walk underneath those viaducts.
Sure.
Those viaducts are going to be repaired now at the federal government's expense.
The city of Chicago and private entities do not.
Well, you just said it's a federal grant.
So a federal grant we can also go and get, which we do annually, we ask for federal dollars to repair viaducts.
So what I'm asking for is what revenue out of this does the city get?
I heard about, and we all want safe workplaces.
I don't know why Amtrak isn't providing that now.
We all want good salaries.
That's literally what you guys said, that you have people here that are saying you don't have a safe place to work.
Why isn't that the case now?
Why aren't you providing a safe place?
My point is that there is no revenue other than a federal grant coming in.
That's not revenue.
We don't count that as revenue when you're talking about city finances, state finances, or federal finances.
That's not revenue.
So what revenue are you bringing to the city of Chicago?
Crystal Zorbaugh Mullins.
The $87 million grant has a $60 million match that is a private match,
and that is the revenue that is going to repair the viaducts that is not state or local money.
Okay.
And Stephen Segelin, I'd add that for Amtrak to do any project that has federal grants, we have to raise that 20 percent non-federal match.
And if we do not have a source of funds like from a private partner, the most common ask is from a local or state partner to meet that match where the service is provided.
And so in this case, the project is achieving that without making a request of local or state match.
Okay. So the $16 million is from Canal Edge then.
Correct.
Okay.
And so the 572 has an additional match.
And Crystal, can you remind me?
Crystal Zorbaugh, Mullen's Law Group, the 572 is on a $715 million project.
So there is actually $143 million between cash and in-kind matches that are going to contribute to that project.
What would the in-kind be?
I'm sorry?
What percentage is the in-kind, and what does in-kind mean?
So in-kind means services being provided, and I don't know the specific percentage of it.
Well, I know what in-kind means, but I was wondering, like, what specific things are there?
Hourly contributions, labor costs, those sorts of things to the project.
Okay, and that will be provided at a later date?
We can supplement our answer to you on that.
Okay, that would be great.
Who's the, can you go back and just let me know, who's the actual purchaser on this then?
Is it?
Crystal Zorba, Mullins Law Group.
So Amtrak is purchasing the Canal Street Yard from Union Pacific.
Canal Edge LLC is the development partner to redevelop the yard into a usable maintenance facility for Amtrak.
And to go back to a comment that you addressed earlier, it's not that Amtrak's operations are not safe.
It's that we want to make them safer and reduce some workplace injuries by having the facilities completely enclosed in the building that reduces or eliminates slip and fall risk that are currently experienced at the 14th Street Yard facility because it's an outdoor-indoor facility.
So when you say that, though, my understanding was that Amtrak built a train wash for $6 million just recently.
Why couldn't you just continue to build on what you have like most people do on these kind of projects and just improve the space as is?
Stephen Segelman from Amtrak. So in the beginning of the presentation, we talked about those reasons
that undertaking a reconstruction of our existing 14th Street Yard would require us to take large
portions of the tracks and maintenance facilities out of operation in order to create the space
to reconstruct a facility and the configuration desired and that bringing facilities and track
out of service offline would have us cascading impact on the train service that we provide to
the city of Chicago. So we would have delays or cancellations of services in order to work
through that the construction would likely have to be phased over potentially five to ten years
and long-term phased construction is one is the most expensive form of construction
and to do it in a live operating environment okay um well i appreciate you guys uh coming in here
today i i can definitely see why people are pretty angry though um to push for this categorical
exclusion on the environmental is pretty shameful um i think and i know there's representatives here
from each organization but i i think it behooves the guy who says he's from chicago to actually
show up and stand by what he's doing to the community um to me this amtrak and uh all the
talk of swaps and um categorical exclusion sounds like the second coming of the railroad barons
um but chairman i i just think um you know we don't this is just a resolution it is an opportunity
for them to put forward their best foot, and I think they've stumbled here,
fallen flat on the face, if you want to really put it that way,
because we've had people come and talk about the need for an improved facility.
You don't go spend $6 million on a wash facility and then turn around
and do something completely different unless there was some other analysis that was done
that really hasn't been put on the table here.
So I would suggest that all the groups here come forward with actual transparent,
a more transparent approach that really...
addresses the need of these 6,000 plus people in these different communities who are simply asking for their community not to be thrown under the train as they are doing here.
So I just ask that as we move forward, much more respect is given to this community than we've seen over the last several months.
And I'm in full support of the resolution as it exists for Chairwoman Lee.
Thank you.
Eric Lynn, Canal Edge, Alderman, thank you for your comments.
And our intent was to be completely transparent here today.
We're happy to come back again another time.
Just to address your one comment, I think you said to the guy who says he's from Chicago, come here and stand up for his project.
I'm here representing Justin Ishpian, Canal Edge, and we're here to stand up for the project and answer any questions that you have.
Thank you.
And I understand that.
I just, you know, all of us do development in our wards, and we have to carry that water.
And when we are carrying that water for development, the owner of the business shows up, and the owner of the business testifies.
And I understand maybe you're the VP, right?
Yeah, I'm the lead on Canal Edge LLC, which is the entity that is developing this with Amtrak.
And maybe he has shown up to other meetings
I don't know
But I just think it behooves him to actually step foot in here
And sit in front of people
And take the hard hits and the hard questions
Like we ask of all the other development teams
That come in here
So thank you
I appreciate the comment
And we're certainly happy to do it again
Thank you
Thank you, Autumn
Okay
Now we move to non-members
Autumn and Dow
Thank you, Mr. Chairman
First, Alderman Lee, I want to thank you for bringing forth the resolution.
I want to thank the Amtrak team for being here.
And I want to underscore and support Alderman Hopkins' request for a letter to obtain the environmental reports
and to support the points that were raised by Alderman Vasquez.
I just want to put some things on the record.
First of all, I think the community outreach that was done on this project has been piss poor.
Not one phone call between 2023 to 2026.
Not an email, not a letter from any part of that team.
given that I represent an area south of 35th Street on the western edge
or the eastern edge of where they anticipate building the train shed.
And so I want to put that on the record.
I'd like to know, in that time, did they alert CHA, CPS, or HUD
of their intentions to build this rail yard and train shed?
Stephen Sagerlin from Amtrak, and I appreciate the comments.
We, as we mentioned, the understanding if there was a property owner, the rail yard owner willing to sell was a challenging discussion that took time to understand if the opportunity was possible.
I appreciate your comments about the need for continued and more engagement, which is what we've been trying.
So the answer is no.
Trying to offer.
The answer is no. And so in three years, there was not a letter, email, phone call to anybody that would be impacted by this development.
Thank you. I also want to put on the record, Mr. Chairman, that I have requested on two occasions for this group to give me the courtesy of having a public meeting with the constituents that I represent on this project.
crickets until I sent the third
email yesterday when I received a call
to tell me that they were focusing on this hearing today and we would
finally get to a community meeting
for the residents that I represent. So I just want to put that on the record.
Thirdly,
Three of the four highest impact noise impact areas are south of 35th Street, near Wentworth Gardens, T.E. Brown Apartments, Progressive Baptist Church, Air Force Academy, and a residential community south of Pershing, the edges of Fuller Park.
And in your paperwork here, it shows that there is a moderate noise impact in this area.
Now, I think a steam generator and air compressors, they make a lot of noise, tons of noise.
So I need to know, what does moderate noise mean exactly?
Crystal Zorbaugh Mullins, I would like to defer to my colleague who couldn't be here today,
Susanna Campbell, to shed light on this, please.
Hi, Susanna Campbell, BFW Engineering.
We actually utilize one of our subs to complete the noise reporting.
But basically what noise levels are, they have different ones, and I can get those exact ones,
but basically some are considered no impact.
Then there are certain decibels that are considered moderate impact.
and then there are certain decibels that are considered severe impacts.
So when the entity reviewed that and looked at those,
there were four locations that did go from no impact to a moderate impact.
And according to FRA, moderate impact decibels are not required to have mitigation.
I didn't ask you that.
I asked you what was a moderate noise impact.
Is there a number?
I don't have that right offhand.
And if you give me a few minutes, I can find that.
All right.
Well, while you're looking at it, I need to know also, even with the moderate impact,
you're suggesting that you can do a west boundary noise barrier or a movable point frogs,
which will reduce the four moderate impacts to no impacts.
So what does that mean?
Crystals or bombillons.
So those were areas that were identified, and we decided as final design would progress,
we would look at whether that noise impact changes based on any of the final design levels,
and then we would reevaluate the decision as to whether or not any additional action is taken.
So that's not my question.
I understand, but that's what the study says.
It's impossible to answer your question until we're further along in the design.
Well, it's not impossible to answer my question.
you do know what a movable point frog is right we do know what a movable point frog is well what is
it that's what i'm asking adam tice wsp so movable movable point frog is a component of the track
that the trains run on just the way the train switches between different components of the
track the frog is a component and different types of frogs can affect the noise associated with that
switching of tracks. Thank you. And what is a west boundary noise barrier? Adam Tice, WSP,
west boundary noise barrier would be simply a wall. A wall. How high is a wall like that typically?
Adam Tice, WSP, it depends on the conditions. So the design would have to dictate that depending
on geometry. This is an elevated railroad, so that would certainly affect the final wall design.
We don't have an answer to that question in any more detail than that.
All right. Thank you.
Now, as I look at the paperwork here, the majority of the south side of the site has not undergone archaeological testing to see what chemicals are in the soil.
It looks like that you did a lot of your archaeological testing north of 30th Street and a smattering south of 30, 33rd Street, which is just a one square block area that you seem to have tested.
But this development goes to 39th Street and even a little bit beyond 39th Street.
So are you going to test these areas?
Crystal Zorba, Mullins.
Susanna can explain that, but there was some additional pre-construction testing.
I don't know if that was in that specific area.
Susanna, can you answer this question, please?
I may need a little bit.
Sorry, this is Susanna Campbell with BFW Engineering.
I may need a little bit of clarification.
You mentioned hazardous materials testing, but then you mentioned.
No, I didn't say hazardous.
I didn't say hazardous.
I said archaeological testing is the term that you all use.
Yes, ma'am.
Well, tell me, what does archaeological testing mean?
Archaeological testing is reporting where you look at below ground soil to see if there are any historic artifacts.
Right. Chemicals. Does that include chemicals?
No, ma'am.
Okay.
Okay. Well, my question remains, do you intend to do archaeological testing south of 33rd Street and chemical testing south of 33rd Street?
Well, archaeological does not have to do with chemical testing.
I understand that. I didn't ask that. I'm not stupid. I asked you, do you intend to, yes or no?
We looked at the entire area, and we did two different reports.
We did an above-ground cultural report, and we looked at below-ground archaeological report.
There were two areas on the site that did have the potential for archaeological artifacts,
and those two areas will have deep testing performed.
Yes.
Okay.
Can I get through the chair where those locations are?
And then my second question is, do you intend to do chemical testing?
This is Susanna Campbell, BFW.
Those areas, there was an area, I believe, on the northern end of the site,
and then there was one on the, I think it's on the southern end of the site.
I will verify those locations.
I don't have that map right in front of me.
As far as chemical testing, we did perform a phase two report for the entire site,
and we did do testing on the site.
And what did you find?
We found historic metals and different things associated with the historic use of a rail yard.
And what does that mean?
There are constituents that were found there.
And what we do is we look at what those levels are compared to what Illinois state levels are that you have to compare those to.
And those soils have to be managed appropriately, whether they're left in place,
whether they're hauled off and sent to a disposal landfill where they can reside, those soils have to be managed appropriately.
All right. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is why we need these studies and reports.
I have one last question and then a comment.
I looked at the paperwork that you provided today,
And it looks like your outbound construction traffic route goes right by Wentworth Gardens, down Wentworth to access the Dan Ryan.
Why are you accessing the Dan Ryan from Pershing and not from 35th Street?
Stephen Seglin from Amatark, let me confer with the team.
That's a very technical answer, and I'm sure there's a number of considerations they had to look into.
too, so it may be something that is best for us to respond and follow up.
Thank you.
Get that through the chair.
Submit that to us.
And then, you know, I just want to make a comment.
Mr. I think it's none.
If you're referring to me, I'm Eric Lynn.
Lynn.
Okay, Mr. Lynn.
You know, you made a comment about how development goes.
But I just want to encourage you all to be really transparent about what you're trying to accomplish here, because I did read yesterday that was a canal purchase Nordstrom's Rack, right?
And so, you know, we all know why. And I just hope that, you know, as we move through this process, that there is a very transparent approach to.
What is being done on the south end of the city and on the north end of the city?
And I'll leave it at that.
Thank you.
Alderman Dowell, thank you for the comments.
And Eric Lynn, Canal Edge, Alderman, thank you for the comments.
And we do intend to be completely transparent, look forward to future discussions about what those developments will be.
All right.
Thank you.
So we're at the end of this and we have another committee.
But one, Nicole, Autumn and Lee will close us out.
And all those that are here for police and fire, please remain in the room.
Autumn and Lee?
Yeah.
I have three quick questions, and then I'll get to my closing statement.
Because I didn't get to ask this earlier.
And it's specifically about impact on area rail traffic.
The South Branch Bridge is the most constricted location in the Chicago terminal.
Has Amtrak undertaken rail traffic control or RTC modeling of the Canal Street Yards operating plan to rigorously test the infrastructure capacity between Canal Yard and Union Station?
So just translation. There's one bridge that comes across the Chicago River.
And if you've gone to Lawrence's Fisheries for shrimp before, you've driven past this.
It doesn't look like a bridge that actually works, but it does.
There's a little house on it. It goes up and down several times a day to accommodate this traffic.
So with the move to the Canal Street Yard, you're going to see increased traffic in the area.
Those 28 trains are going to have to go back and forth from Union Station to get service and then back to Union Station afterwards.
Can someone comment on this?
If you've done the RTC modeling and if you have, will you share the outputs as well as the input data and assumptions?
And if not, will you commit to doing so and disclosing the results and the inputs?
So I'm Stephen Sagerlin from Amtrak.
We have done RTC modeling. Our trains, in order to enter the current yard at 14th Street, have to back up over the bridge past the foul point and often even foul the Canadian National Interchange in order to enter our yard.
So all of our trains currently today are using that bridge and stopping on it in order to enter into our yard.
And that stoppage on the bridge and then the pull forward movement takes a significant time compared to a continuous movement where you would roll over the bridge, which in the Canal Street plan, we would not have to stop.
So the RTC modeling looked at those tradeoffs of stopping versus continuing, and so that was a better improvement to continue rather than to stop on the bridge.
And we've been discussing with the city of Department for Planning and Development, the review process for all of these designs and plans and studies that including this RTC model.
And we look forward to continuing that conversation so we can get that review and comment.
Will you provide the modeling and the inputs and the data assumptions that I just asked about for independent review?
We'll discuss it and let you know.
Mr. Segerlin, how long does a project of this nature and magnitude generally take from start to finish, not start to finish, from start, like the idea of it, to actually breaking ground?
And what conditions need to be met before you're breaking ground?
Stephen Sutherland from Amtrak.
There is not a consistent path for projects from the moment of conception when you're screening and identifying challenges, screening potential solutions, looking at what those are, understanding the cost to perform that solution, doing the due diligence to clarify the cost,
understanding if there is capital that can be raised through grants or other sources to deliver
that project securing that capital the environmental review so i explained this ad nauseum list of
items because it is complicated meandering and starts and stops and fits and all projects are
different and they don't get consistent funding to say that there is one typical schedule i i get
There's many steps in it.
I was just asking, based on your experience and other projects that you've worked on, like the Seattle project, how long did that take from start to finish?
I'm only aware of the construction timeline for that project. I don't know the entire history of that project, including its original conception and funding schedule. But the construction period for that project was somewhere between 18 and 24 months.
I was asking for the time period from inception to groundbreaking.
I know once you start, you've already started and you're going to finish in record time.
I've talked to people in the railroad industry.
I've talked to people who have worked for Amtrak.
Every single one says that this project has gone so quickly, that these projects take years, years to decide on a site, years to design a site, years to get the funding.
So it leaves the question of, for me, and I think it's pretty obvious, that when the funding became available, because you didn't think you were going to get that, you got funding from a private developer who, under this administration, has very favorable conditions around public-private partnerships.
And that's why this is going so fast.
I've asked so many times now, what is the rush to get shovels in the ground?
Originally, you told me the fall of this year.
Now that's been moved to the beginning of 2027.
As I've said many times before, too, it takes longer to get a zoning change in the city of Chicago than to move through this process and get shovels in the ground when you haven't even finalized the design of this plan.
So can you tell this body what the timeline is that you've shared with the public for this project?
Steven Secklin from Amtrak.
Yes, we had been talking about getting into construction in 2027.
But as we are here today and as we've been having meetings, we've been asking for feedback.
We have connected with the City Department for Planning and Development to talk about the review process.
Every project has the evaluation of the feedback that is received as it advances into design, and that can alter the schedule.
And so we are endeavoring to do that right now.
We are making ourselves available.
We're trying to increase the frequency of that availability,
and we are working to get the documents released that have been requested,
and we'll continue to do so and look forward to having the meetings to review those in detail prior to construction.
Will Amtrak commit and the development team commit to not putting one shovel in the ground
until we have been able to obtain an environmental impact study to share with the community.
These are all things that I think are very reasonable requests made by the community
and for any community in this situation.
I've asked for you all to pump the brakes, engage with the community in a transparent, authentic way
where you're listening to what the community is saying
and that you're providing the documentation.
And we will file the FOIAs.
I filed a FOIA with the FRA already, and we will work with others.
And this, we can't keep coming back and saying we don't have it, we don't have it.
It's the FRA, it's the FRA.
This administration is trying to ram this down our throats,
and frankly, that's not what we're about here in the city of Chicago.
The City of Chicago treats its citizens and its residents fairly and through the processes that have been established so that there is opportunity and transparency, opportunity for residents to be heard and transparency around these reports.
I know that you've said that you're working with the Department of Planning and Development.
I look forward to those conversations around how you're working with the city.
If the city comes back and asks you for something, whether that is additional testing on anything or additional reports,
is that something that you're going to be able to comply with, or are you just ticking a box here?
So in that discussion, Stephen Sagerlin from Amtrak, discussions with the city when we get that review process advancing,
If there are requests for items, we will evaluate the merit of that request, and we will consider to undertake it.
On behalf of my community, Chair, I appreciate the time that you've given us today for the subject matter.
And to my colleagues that have been here and asked questions as well, I think it's clear that this project isn't ready for prime time,
And I encourage all of us to support the resolution opposing this development as it is currently planned and its current location.
Thank you for the time.
Thank you, Audemant Lee.
Can I get a motion to recommend approval of this item?
Audemant Wadgespecso moves on the motion.
All in favor say aye.
Those opposed, no.
In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it.
There being no further business before the committee, can I get a motion to adjourn?
Audemant Wadgespecso moves.
The meeting of the Committee on Transgender Public Way is now adjourned.
Thank you.
Oh, J.C. Lawrence