Trains have a blast while in Palatine

No matter what the Village of Palatine does to comply with the federal rail-crossing safety-upgrade program, the UP train engineers will never observe "quiet zones" while traveling through Palatine.

It seems that Palatine has the unenviable distinction of being exactly halfway between Harvard and Chicago. This means that almost every train going eastbound meets a westbound train once per hour, right here in downtown Palatine.

Whereas the eastbound trains will ding their bell or briefly toot their horn a bit, the "cowboy engineers" on the westbound trains seem to delight in letting go with a steady, deafening, shrill blast of their horn for 5 seconds or more. They are like immature kids shouting as loud as they can, "Here I come, folks" as they barrel through town.

This makes Palatine by far the loudest zone on the entire Northwest line. Other towns may qualify for quiet zone status, but Palatine is stuck with unbelievable, shattering train noise all day long!

Larry Schmidt

Palatine