City Of New Orleans Trains To Reach New Orleans Again Starting Tuesday
NEW ORLEANS (CBS) -- Amtrak says the City of New Orleans passenger train will pull into its namesake city this coming Tuesday, the first time since late August.
As WBBM Newsradio's Dave Berner reports, service on the train route – which originates at Chicago's Union Station – was suspended because of Hurricane Isaac.
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Train service from Chicago will start and end in Memphis until Tuesday, Sept. 11. Passengers with tickets for suspended trains can get a refund with a voucher for full travel.
Meanwhile, the other Amtrak routes with service to and from New Orleans are now back in service. Those are the Sunset Limited between New Orleans and Los Angeles, and the Crescent between New Orleans and New York City.
The City of New Orleans train follows the old Illinois Central tracks, alongside Metra Electric and South Shore Line trains on the city's South Side, and Saluki and Illini trains through the rest of the state all the way to Carbondale.
South of Carbondale, the train passes through Memphis, and Jackson, Miss., before arriving in New Orleans.
Amtrak cites the City of New Orleans route as a tour of the nation's musical heritage, "from Chicago with its world-class Chicago Symphony Orchestra and still vibrant electric blues scene, to Beale Street in Memphis," and "the history-laden musical crossroads of Mississippi to New Orleans - the birthplace of jazz." But the route is actually associated most with a folk song that bears its name, written by Chicago singer-songwriter Steve Goodman and recorded most famously by Arlo Guthrie.
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