Madison Wisconsin Amtrak station Q and A with Governor Doyle and Mayor Cieslewicz

Very exciting news in Wisconsin to expand Amtrak service between Madison and Wisconsin (as a fundamental piece of the Minneapolis-St. Paul - Madison - Milwaukee - Chicago high speed rail line) as the site for the train station in Madison has been chosen right downtown at the Department of Administration building.

Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle and Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz took questions from reporters from the rooftop of the building that will host the train station a week ago, and thanks to Learfield News for grabbing this eight minute feed of the discussion between the two high speed rail leaders and the press.



The Madison-Milwaukee line is a very exciting project as it helps bring the entire Midwest high speed rail network into reality. Like any network, the more spokes there are, the stronger the entire network becomes, so adding in Madison-Milwaukee to the Midwestern Amtrak network will grow ridership for the entire system. And that will reduce our oil consumption, increase our mobility, reduce our traffic congestion. And each of those things will make us wealthier. That's a higher standard of living for all of us. Great news!

When these trains are running between Madison and Milwaukee (and we're still shooting for 2011, according to Governor Doyle), I can't wait to take one. It is not fun to get between Madison and Chicago with a three hour drive. I predict a large amount of traffic between Chicago and Madison on the train.