There's this dead rail line, the Bloomingdale Line, that runs east-west across Chicago at about 1700 north. Some folks are working to convert it to a bike trail- an elevated bike path would make getting across town a fast and pleasant task. I'm not so excited about it, you see, for I have a vested interest in a) elevated and abandoned areas that are tallbike-accessible, and b) abandoned rails that might be used for railbiking.

The Rails-to-Trails folks (or their allies) have color-coded the dead and live rail lines on this year's bike map. Very handy. Not too many of those type of advocates like to admit that the program is really intended to maintain railway right-of-ways until our country gets over this stupid flying phase. Still, as bike paths in the meantime, they are excellent places to go on an outing (or get from here to there).

We ride on the Bloomingdale line anyway, even though it's all overgrown. Somebody's been using it to park trains, and riding past a train over streets you know really gives you a sense of how *long* those things are! I can imagine trying to park one, say, from Ashland and Kimball (a mile and a half apart). Kinda amazing that if you have the infrastructure in place, vehicles a mile long become the most efficient way to carry cargo across land.