Canal Street Yard Assessment Stays Open Through December 7
Published: November 9, 2026
By: Adam Burns
The Federal Railroad Administration signed an environmental assessment of Amtrak plans for the Canal Street Yard in Chicago on November 6, 2026. The 30-day public inspection period stays open through December 7, 2026. Comments go through Regulations.gov under docket FRA-2026-2938. The agency says the project page will be updated once public meeting information is finalized and confirmed.
The two yards
The assessment says Chicago is the central hub of the Amtrak network. Maintenance and inspection are now at the 14th Street Yard, between Polk Street and Lumber Street just south of 18th Street. The assessment also identifies that yard as 1400 S. Lumber Street, “Amtrak’s currently used 14th Street Yard.” It was originally constructed by the Union Station Consortium, the Pennsylvania Railroad, the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy, the Michigan Central, and the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway, since the 1880s.
Canal Street Yard is an existing elevated yard about 1.8 miles south of Chicago Union Station, between South Canal Street and South Stewart Avenue, from about 550 feet north of West Cermak Road to West 38th Street, in Cook County, Illinois. It was constructed in 1913, is owned by the Union Pacific, and is being acquired by Amtrak.
What the assessment studies
The FRA project page says the agency is providing federal funding to redevelop Canal Street Yard from a freight rail yard into a modern maintenance facility and coach yard. The purpose stated there is to modernize and consolidate Amtrak Chicago-area maintenance for a state of good repair, support safe and efficient passenger rail service, and provide capacity for current and future fleet demands on state-supported Midwest routes and long-distance service nationwide. The project would replace aging facilities at the 14th Street Yard with a purpose-built complex at Canal Street.
The work described in the assessment would stay inside the existing yard footprint: a new maintenance and inspection building, fueling and support facilities, a train wash and a wheel-truing facility, reconfigured yard tracks and platforms, and yard-wide utility, access, drainage, and security improvements. It also calls for repair and rehabilitation, including in-kind replacement of deteriorated structural elements, of 17 railroad structures which include 11 viaducts and six bridges. The assessment refers to that group, collectively, as viaducts. They carry the yard and the approach tracks over public streets between Cermak Road and West 38th Street. The FRA project page describes the same added work as structural repairs to seventeen viaducts.
The assessment also includes purchase or lease, and fit-out, of an off-site commissary near the yard for food, beverages, and related supplies. The FRA is the lead federal agency. Amtrak is the project sponsor. The document was prepared under the National Environmental Policy Act, 23 CFR Part 771, Section 4(f), and Section 106.
An earlier report covers the decision to prepare an assessment.
Why Canal Street
The assessment says the 14th Street Yard has deteriorated infrastructure, limited indoor capacity, and outdated building systems. Its tracks are less than half the length of the tracks at Canal Street. Trains must be separated to be serviced and then reassembled. The longer Canal Street tracks would allow a train to be serviced intact as a single consist. The 14th Street Yard also has outdated electrical systems, fueling systems, and stormwater controls.
In the assessment, the purpose is a State of Good Repair, safe and efficient passenger service, and capacity for current fleet demands on State Supported routes and Long Distance service nationwide. It says the 14th Street facilities cannot efficiently support projected increases in fleet size or new rolling stock.
The viaducts
The assessment says the yard and its approach tracks are carried over 17 public streets by viaducts built in 1905 to 1907, with widenings in 1917 and in 1926 to 1927. WSP inspections and load ratings in February and March 2026 found decks with spalling over as much as 90 percent of their area, exposed and corroded reinforcement, and full-depth punchthrough holes. Steel girders, floor beams, stringers, and bearings showed up to 100 percent local section loss and isolated failed members. Steel columns and concrete abutments showed section loss, holes, cracking, and large spalls. The controlling elements are floor beams, roadway stringers, and concrete deck and beam elements. Without rehabilitation, the assessment says, the deterioration would increase risk to motorists, pedestrians, and bicyclists under the structures and would preclude reliable use of the yard.
The alternatives
The assessment evaluates one Build alternative and a No Build alternative. Under No Build, Amtrak would keep Chicago-area maintenance at the 14th Street Yard with routine maintenance and repairs, and Canal Street Yard would not be improved for Amtrak use.
In 2024 Amtrak considered three locations: rebuilding in place at the 14th Street Yard, moving to the Union Pacific Global One Yard, and moving to the Union Pacific Canal Street Yard. Rebuilding in place was dismissed because the confined yard cannot be expanded, because construction would displace tracks and disrupt Amtrak, Metra, and freight operations for years, and because the rebuilt facility would still lack the space the railroad says it needs. Global One was dismissed because Amtrak trains would have to cross the BNSF Chicago Subdivision to reach it, because several structures over city streets would need replacement, because the site was not available from Union Pacific for acquisition, because access by local streets would be prohibitively inefficient, and because the larger size would add substantial acquisition cost. The assessment says Canal Street Yard, established in 1913, would give Amtrak-controlled access to Chicago Union Station.
The assessment says the FRA approved a categorical exclusion on May 12, 2026, for construction of the maintenance facilities at Canal Street Yard. An appendix also lists a May 1, 2025 categorical exclusion for acquisition of the yard and for security fencing and cameras. A later section says the Build alternative assumes that the acquisition, the fencing and cameras, and use of the yard for storage, which were previously excluded, may proceed. After inspections found that the viaduct repairs were essential, the assessment says the FRA in August 2026 selected that rehabilitation work for funding under the National program of the Federal-State Partnership for Intercity Passenger Rail. Because the project now includes work the earlier exclusion did not cover, the FRA prepared this assessment. The project page says the agency first concluded that construction of the maintenance facilities qualified for a categorical exclusion, and that it decided on an assessment after Amtrak sought federal funding to repair the viaducts.
After the public inspection period, the assessment says, the FRA will issue a Finding of No Significant Impact or, if it determines the project will result in reasonably foreseeable significant effects, prepare an environmental impact statement.
How to comment
Comments must be submitted through Regulations.gov. The FRA contact on the project page is the Office of Environmental Program Management, 1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE, West Building, Mail Stop 20, Washington, DC 20590, FRAEnvironment@dot.gov. Media queries go to 202-493-6024 or FRAPA@dot.gov. The page links a project website, mwmaintenancefacility.com, and a Permitting Dashboard entry for the project. The page was last updated Friday, November 6, 2026.
Related reading on American-Rails.com
- Canal Street Maintenance Plan Will Get an FRA Review
- Union Pacific Railroad: Map, History, Logo
- Rail News
Sources
- Federal Railroad Administration, Midwest Maintenance Facility project page, railroads.dot.gov/rail-network-development/environment/environmental-reviews/midwest-maintenance-facility, last updated Friday, November 6, 2026. Federal funding to redevelop Canal Street Yard from a freight yard into a maintenance facility and coach yard. Purpose language uses a state of good repair, state-supported Midwest routes, and long-distance service. The page says Amtrak later sought federal funding to repair seventeen viaducts, and that the FRA then decided to prepare an environmental assessment. The assessment was signed November 6, 2026. Public inspection runs through December 7, 2026. Docket FRA-2026-2938. Comments go through Regulations.gov. Public meeting information is not yet finalized. Contact Office of Environmental Program Management, FRAEnvironment@dot.gov. Media 202-493-6024, FRAPA@dot.gov.
- Amtrak, for the Federal Railroad Administration, Midwest Maintenance Facility Environmental Assessment, November 2026, Regulations.gov docket FRA-2026-2938, downloads.regulations.gov/FRA-2026-2938-0001/attachment_1.pdf. Canal Street Yard is about 1.8 miles south of Chicago Union Station, owned by Union Pacific, and being acquired by Amtrak. Constructed in 1913. The 14th Street Yard is between Polk Street and Lumber Street. Seventeen railroad structures include 11 viaducts and six bridges, collectively called viaducts. WSP inspections in February and March 2026. One Build alternative and a No Build alternative. Three 2024 locations, with rebuild-in-place and Global One dismissed. Categorical exclusion for maintenance-facility construction dated May 12, 2026. Appendix B also lists a May 1, 2025 exclusion for acquisition and security fencing and cameras. August 2026 selection of viaduct rehabilitation for Federal-State Partnership National program funding is stated without a dollar figure in this assessment.
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