Originally Posted by
Dexlin
It appears to me that you are quite a few years behind the times on who owns the rail in this area and what exactly the hinderances are and aren't.
No new construction is needed, first of all, because the state now owns the line from West Detroit Junction in Detroit all the way west to Kalamazoo. Not only that, but the state has has re-doubled the track between between Dearborn to Yspi and put millions of dollars into refurbishing it, primarily for Amtrak. There is barely any freight service on this line, anymore, so traffic is no longer an issue.
The literal only issue and hidderance left for the service is political will. Had the millage for the RTA that very narrowly failed in 2016 passed, the planned service between the city and the airport would have been nothing to get off the ground. The state bought the locomotives which we still have, and had the Republicans in the legislature not thrown a fit over our lease of the cars, we'd still have those, too. There is already permission to use this line, basically.
Let's not mislead people. A basic commuter service on Amtrak/MDOT's Michigan Line could be restarted practically tomorrow. No new rail, not even refurbishment of the existing rail needs to be done.