With the prospects for passenger rail service between Madison and Milwaukee looking better than they have in years, there are still barriers to overcome before the so-called Hiawatha West line can become a reality.
However, one of those barriers is not a lack of commuter interest in the service, according to Arun Rao, senior director of network development for Amtrak.
Rao took part April 30 in a webinar of the Madison and Milwaukee Downtown exchange program, which focused on the proposed Hiawatha West Amtrak line that could begin serving business and other commuters as early as 2030.
Moderated by Jason Ilstrup, president of Downtown Madison Inc., the program also featured Rick Harnish, executive director of the High-Speed Rail Alliance, a nonprofit dedicated to connecting North American communities with high-speed trains.
While the Hiawatha West line, an extension of existing Amtrak Hiawatha service between Milwaukee and Chicago, won’t be a high-speed line — the train will travel at a more conventional 79 miles per hour through three of the state’s most populous counties — Rao outlined what he called conservative ridership estimates based on the industry standard travel demand model for two daily round trips between Madison and Milwaukee.
“It’s a conservative model for various reasons, and it is still showing tremendous ridership numbers and results here — over 260,000 additional (annual) riders to the Hiawatha service just from extending these two round trips (for Hiawatha West),” Rao said.
To put that in perspective, the existing Chicago to Milwaukee Hiawatha service carried 681,600 annual passengers in fiscal year 2025, Rao said.
Between Milwaukee and Madison, there would be planned stops in Pewaukee in Waukesha County and in Watertown in Jefferson County before ending in downtown Madison, where a downtown station site is preferred by city officials.
A new Amtrak train station could be part of the redevelopment of a former state office building at 1 W. Wilson St, and the proposed sale of the building to Landmark Development Services Co. for $10 million will be reviewed May 13 by the State Building Commission.
“And 51,000, or about 19% of new passengers, are anticipated to travel between Milwaukee and Madison (alone),” Rao said. “There could be a lot more, but that’s what the initial travel demand model is putting out there.”
Actual ridership numbers of the Borealis line, which serves the Twin Cities, Milwaukee and Chicago and launched in May 2024 with 600 daily passengers, offers additional evidence of commuter interest.
“Trains were selling out right out of the gate,” Rao said. “There was no ramp up period and by serving about 600 daily passengers, and over 400,000 passengers since we launched, we’ve blown out rider projections.”
Rao said Amtrak is close to completing a service development plan for the Hiawatha West line, which is one of the biggest steps of the entire development process.
“The reason why Amtrak has taken this on is that this is nationally one of the most promising corridors or extensions that Amtrak sees across the country, and we wanted to get involved here in order to move it faster and more efficiently and cost effectively,” Rao said. “So, we’re going to finish this important step in June, and our goal right now is to get this into the next step.”
Rao said the next step is preliminary engineering and environmental clearance of the railroad improvements and station improvements needed to qualify for federal funding. Rao said in an email the capital expense would not include a new train set because Amtrak would use existing equipment for the western extension.
“(We want to) get into that stuff as soon as possible this year,” he said. “That’s going to take a big effort working with our partners at the Federal Railroad Administration and the state of Wisconsin, etcetera, but that’s what we want to see.”
Roa said Amtrak believes it can get preliminary engineering done within nine months once it’s started, and then it will be ready for final design and construction.
Some uncertainty comes with the timing of grant programs.
“Obviously, this will be in next year’s cycle or the following year for this final design and construction,” Rao said. “So, depending on when that happens, once we get that grant, it’ll then be about two to three years of final design and construction.
“So, if you were to do the math, the earliest that would be is 2030,” Rao said, “but again, it depends on the timing of those certain factors.”
Courting business
Rao reiterated the Hiawatha West line would add the second (Dane) and third (Waukesha) most populous counties in the state of Wisconsin to Chicago and connections to the national passenger rail network. It would create an estimated 200 permanent jobs and generate over $20 million in visitor spending in Greater Madison, and it would provide a safe, reliable and convenient alternative to vehicular travel on Interstate 90/94.
The estimated economic benefit is $46.3 million, and Rao said it would justify the necessary state and federal expenses involved with modest infrastructure improvements to existing rail.
He said the state funds the current Hiawatha service through a biennial state budget appropriation of $5.6 million for six daily round trips. “Another $2.5 million in annual operating support will get you these two round trips extended to these three counties (for Hiawatha West).”
Given the hurdles ahead, which include dedicated funding from the state Legislature, Rao enlisted the help of the business community.
“There’s a lot of work going on and this is where we’ll need all of your help,” he said. “We’ll need especially the business community’s help as the budget process moves along to help push that forward.”
Rao and Harnish said the success of a Hiawatha West line could spark additional daily trips to and from Madison and more Amtrak rail extensions in Wisconsin, including a Hiawatha line from Milwaukee north to Green Bay.
“I think that it’s very reasonable to expect, in a developed country, that you should be able to get on a train every hour in Madison and also go to Green Bay with the connection of Milwaukee to Chicago or to St. Paul (with Borealis), and also to be able to catch a bus to Stevens Point or to the southwest part of the state,” Harnish said. “I think that’s a reasonable thing to expect.
“It’s going to take a very big shift in the way people address the Legislature,” Harnish said, “and what they expect from the Legislature to make that happen.”
