Campus (train)

Campus

Overview
Service type	Inter-city rail
Status	Discontinued
Locale	Illinois
First service	November 14, 1971
Last service	March 5, 1972
Former operator(s)	Amtrak
Route
Start	Chicago
Stops	2
End	Champaign-Urbana
Distance travelled	127 miles (204 km)
Average journey time	2 hours 10 minutes
Service frequency	Friday/Sunday
Train number(s)	394 and 395
On-board services
Catering facilities	On-board cafe
Technical
Track gauge	4 ft 8 ^1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)
Track owner(s)	Illinois Central
Route map Legend Dist. Station 0 mi Chicago 22 mi 35 km Homewood 112 mi 180 km Rantoul 127 mi 204 km Champaign-Urbana to Carbondale

The Campus was a passenger train operated by Amtrak between Chicago and Champaign, Illinois. The Chicago-Champaign corridor already saw two trains daily: the Shawnee (Chicago-Carbondale) and the Panama Limited (Chicago-New Orleans). The Campus made a round-trip Friday and Sunday, serving the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. A second train, the Illini, made a Friday trip. The Campus first appeared on the November 14, 1971, timetable, the first timetable Amtrak issued with its own numbers.^[1] Amtrak discontinued the Campus and Illini on March 5, 1972. Both trains had used Central Station, which Amtrak was abandoning; Amtrak judged that the additional 35–40 minutes necessary to serve Union Station made the schedule impractical.^[2] The Campus was the last passenger train to use Central Station.^[3]:100

References

1. "Nationwide schedules of intercity passenger service". Amtrak. November 14, 1971. Retrieved April 10, 2010.
2. In fact, a re-launched Illini needed only an additional fifteen minutes to make the trip in 1974. "All-America Schedules". Amtrak. November 15, 1974. Retrieved April 10, 2010.
3. Sanders, Craig (2006). Amtrak in the Heartland. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-34705-X. OCLC 61499942.