It’s hard to fight a railroad. Local residents and local governments have learned that lesson over many years.
The railroad in question is the Union Pacific. This major freight hauler runs on the Green Line embankment through Oak Park and then gradually down to ground level in River Forest as it heads toward switching yards in Melrose Park. Choose to live along rail lines and you can expect some noise from engines, from whistles, from starts and stops. Don’t complain to us about that.
But over the past decade Union Pacific has changed the rules of annoyance and impacted neighbors and village government, especially in River Forest, as they have attempted to fight back.
Chicago — you may know this — is dead center for massive freight train congestion in America. All tracks from all points of the map lead to Chicago. Some pass through. Some are reformed. Some switch direction. None of it is simple or smooth or fast. The infrastructure is fully inadequate, rail yards nowhere near big enough to absorb all the incoming freight traffic.
That is why long trains so often simply park on tracks in Oak Park and River Forest. There is no place for them to go. So they sit. Not quietly but with engines roaring to provide power and cooling for all those freight cars piled on behind. The noise is deafening and endless.
Municipal attempts to cajole and persuade have gone unheard. Tickets and fines in the tens of thousands are simply paid as a cost of doing business. Residents of nearby homes and condos shut doors and windows in all seasons, abandon balconies, and never give up fighting.
As we report today, one resident installed two noise monitors and accuses Union Pacific of exceeding federal noise standards while lying about it. A petition drive continues. And public officials from River Forest Village President Cathy Adduci to Congressman Danny Davis have met — or will meet — with railroad officials.
This all becomes more urgent as a third rail line is constructed along the right-of-way. More noise, more fight.
