Barrington hopes to hold onto underpass grant

Barrington officials are hoping the U.S. House’s vote, apparently cutting $2.8 million already awarded for a railroad underpass, will be but a hiccup in village efforts to cope with increased freight traffic from Canadian National.

Village President Karen Darch said U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin last week told her he thought it would be unprecedented for Congress to take back money that is already awarded.

With the senator promising to back the project in discussions between the two houses this week, the Barrington village board will go ahead and approve paperwork tonight (Monday) that should move the status of the grant money from awarded to “obligated.”

“We’re finishing the protocol that was in place before they took their vote,” Darch said. “It’s not clear that (the funds are) lost and hopefully not.”

The money from the U.S. Department of Transportation is for engineering a grade separation where the former Elgin, Joliet & Eastern railroad crosses Northwest Highway. Total construction of the project, intended to mitigate the impact of CN’s increased freight traffic on the line, is estimated at about $69 million, Darch said.

The potential threat to the project comes just as Barrington is expecting a ruling in its lawsuit arguing that the Surface Transportation Board’s approval of CN’s purchase of the railroad was flawed in its assessment of environmental and public safety impacts.

The case also involves CN’s own petition for judicial review, arguing that the requirement for it to pay for a large share of grade separations at Ogden Avenue in Aurora and Lincoln Highway in Lynwood was unprecedented, unjustified and beyond the STB’s regulatory authority.

CN was not required to pay any funds toward a grade separation in Barrington, but the village believes the regional impact makes such a project appropriate for federal assistance, Darch said.

“This clearly is an appropriate federal project,” she said. “It’s appropriate for federal highway funds.”

Barrington officials expect to hear the outcome of negotiations between the two houses of Congress by the end of this week, and the ruling in their U.S. Court of Appeals case before the end of March.