Amtrak launches the Borealis, a second daily train between St. Paul and Chicago

Frederick Melo, Pioneer Press
Updated ·8 min read
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Amtrak launches the Borealis, a second daily train between St. Paul and Chicago

It was Galileo in the early 1600s who is said to have first dubbed the seemingly supernatural northern lights the aurora borealis, combining the name Aurora, goddess of the dawn, and Boreas, the personification of the north wind. On Tuesday, following decades of advocacy and speculation by rail fans, a passenger train broke through the proverbial clouds and rolled into Ramsey County’s Union Depot transit hub in downtown St. Paul, launching Amtrak’s Borealis service, a second daily round trip between Minnesota’s capital city and Chicago.

The midday train, which originates in St. Paul at 11:50 a.m., will make the same stops as the daily Empire Builder between the Capital City and Milwaukee, and then mirror Amtrak’s Hiawatha service from Milwaukee to Chicago, arriving in the Windy City around 7:15 p.m., with tickets starting at $41 one-way.

Another Borealis train is scheduled to leave downtown Chicago’s Union Station at 11:05 a.m. daily and roll into St. Paul each evening at 6:29 p.m., meaning passengers deboarding at either location would arrive in time for a night out on the town. The westbound Empire Builder, by contrast, arrives in St. Paul from Chicago shortly before 11 p.m. The eastbound Builder arrives in St. Paul around 8:30 a.m. and is scheduled to arrive in Chicago at 4:45 p.m. — assuming there have been no delays since the train departed Seattle/Portland, Ore.

“Now a family vacation to the (Wisconsin) Dells or to Milwaukee just got a whole lot easier for families,” said Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, introducing the inaugural departure of the Borealis on Tuesday.

After opening its doors to the public for photos and walk-throughs, the Borealis — a locomotive and five passenger cars — left downtown St. Paul shortly before noon, making stops in Red Wing, Minn.; Winona, Minn.; La Crosse, Wis.; Tomah, Wis.; the Wisconsin Dells; Portage, Wis.; Columbus, Wis.; Milwaukee; the Milwaukee International Airport; Sturtevant, Wis.; Glenview, Ill.; and Chicago.

Views of Mississippi River

Amtrak officials noted that the Borealis offers the opportunity to sit in the café car — or coach or business class — and enjoy the view of the Mississippi River between St. Paul and La Crosse during daylight hours in both directions for the 7½-hour trip to Chicago, while still arriving at either major terminus in time for dinner.

It also offers wide reclining seats, no middle seats, free Wi-Fi and one-way coach fares starting at $41 to traverse the 13 stations — comparable or cheaper than flying — and fares as low as $7 each way between St. Paul and Red Wing.

That said, passengers noted that its relatively narrow, single-deck Horizon coach cars have a far different feel than the double-decker Empire Builder and fewer amenities than more modern cars. Built in the late 1980s, the Horizon trains require stairway boarding and offer limited business seating and no baggage car, so bicycles are not yet allowed.

“I need to ask the question — why can’t we get bike racks on there?” said Ramsey County Commissioner Rafael Ortega, a longtime advocate for the second train to Chicago who has chaired the county’s Regional Railroad Authority, off and on, for 20 years. “If that was on each train, that would be significant.”

Some took the relatively humble Horizon coaches in stride.

“The business class is OK. It’s small,” said Diego Vazquez, a diehard rail traveler and proprietor of the YouTube channel TrainWreckPoet, noting the difference between coach and business seating was minor. “Next time I do this, I’ll just go coach. I love that they finally did this. I’ve been waiting for years.”

Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari said some states have offered to lease or buy rights to more modern train cars such as the Siemens Venture or the even newer Siemens Airo, which offer low-level platform boarding — a benefit for the disabled — as well as other modern amenities.

That would require additional investment from the state of Minnesota, which effectively leases the Horizon cars from Amtrak. “There’s no immediate plans to replace these cars with the Venture cars,” Magliari said Tuesday.

In addition to Ortega and the lieutenant governor, speakers during the morning program at Union Depot included Amit Bose, administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration, and Stephen Gardner, the chief executive officer of Amtrak, as well as state Sen. Scott Dibble and state Rep. Frank Hornstein, who advocated for state funding to cover capital construction.

U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar phoned in remarks from Washington, where she was occupied with the work of the Senate Judiciary Committee. “There’s no such thing as a Democratic bridge or a Republican bridge,” said Klobuchar, quoting the late U.S. Rep. Jim Oberstar of Minnesota, a longtime advocate for federal transit funding.

Transportation officials in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Illinois said key funding fell into place with the federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law of 2021, which authorized some $550 billion in spending on roads, bridges and mass transit, as well as water and broadband infrastructure, from 2022 to 2026.

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The 411-mile Borealis is Amtrak’s sixth-longest state-backed passenger rail corridor, and its capital costs came together through a long-sought partnership between Minnesota, Wisconsin and Illinois. Minnesota contributed $10 million, Wisconsin $7 million, Amtrak $5 million and the Federal Railroad Administration $34 million.

The three states added additional funding to cover operating costs, with a one-time grant of $13 million from the FRA. Some 230,000 passengers are expected to use the service annually. Around 400 passengers rode each way on Tuesday.

Amtrak, which maintains 29 state-supported routes with 18 state partners, operates the Borealis on tracks maintained by the Canadian Pacific Kansas City Railway.

In 1993, longtime Pioneer Press business columnist Dave Beal opined that the fortunes of Minneapolis-St. Paul, Chicago and stops in between would be boosted by better rail connections, namely a high-speed train from the Twin Cities to Chicago. High-speed rail, which is common in Europe, China and Japan, remains largely elusive in the United States, though one line — Amtrak’s Acela Express — reaches speeds of up to 150 mph as it traverses the 450-mile northeast corridor from Washington to Boston in 6½ hours.

Reopening Union Depot

With top speeds of about 80 mph, the Borealis is no Japanese bullet train. But officials in cities along the route have high hopes that improving passenger rail connections will boost commerce and tourism. Ramsey County officials, through the Regional Railroad Authority, have spent much of the past decade or more advocating for Amtrak’s second daily Chicago train — a service not seen since 1979 — spending some $243 million to begin a two-year restoration of the St. Paul Union Depot in 2011.

After decades in proverbial mothballs, the county reopened the 1923 depot’s long-shuttered waiting room and concourse and relaunched interstate passenger rail service there in 2014, with Amtrak relocating from a station in St. Paul’s Midway. The last passenger train before then departed Union Depot in 1971. The depot was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.

Ortega said he saw a bright future for the Borealis and potential connecting lines, as well as for the underutilized Union Depot, which has suffered from high turnover among its small vendors. Restaurant space currently sits vacant, though he said a new tenant is on the horizon, and Choo Choo Bob’s toy train store recently moved into a retail spot.

“I’m hoping that the increased activity will bring a more family-oriented environment,” Ortega said. “People will feel safer. Choo Choo Bob’s was part of that — we did a ribbon-cutting a couple weeks ago. We’ve got a new restaurant in, and we’re making sure that it’s family-friendly.”

The Empire Builder — which honors St. Paul railroad baron James J. Hill and his Great Northern Railway — has long offered passenger rail service through St. Paul from Seattle and Portland to Chicago, but passengers have routinely complained about delays, often due to conflicts with freight railroads, which lease their tracks to Amtrak but retain priority for their operations.

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The Empire Builder’s timing hasn’t always been ideal, even on the best of days, noted Dee Bender, a Mississippi River cruise line greeter with Red Wing Riverboat Greeters.

Assuming there hasn’t been a weather or freight delay, the Empire Builder to Chicago rolls through Red Wing around 9:45 a.m., returning through the riverside station around 9:45 p.m. on its way back to St. Paul and points west. That would make for a long day for Twin Cities tourists, especially a family with kids out to explore Red Wing.

On the Borealis, “you can get here with kids and back in the same day,” said Bender, one of several dozen onlookers at the Red Wing station who applauded the train’s 12:35 p.m. arrival Tuesday. “It’s tough to arrive here at (around) 9 a.m. and leave at 9:30 p.m.”