Top Amtrak officials have endorsed a plan that would bring back passenger rail service to Cowley County. The plan is to extend the existing Heartland Flyer route linking Fort Worth and Oklahoma City to the north, to Wichita and Newton, with a stop in Arkansas City. The expanded line would include stops in Edmond, Guthrie, Perry and Ponca City in Oklahoma; and Arkansas City and Wichita in Kansas. “There is a lot of excitement surrounding passenger rail and its impact on our community,” Ark City Mayor Scott Rogers said in an email on Monday. “Our community and citizens would have direct connections to bigger metropolitan areas such as Dallas, Oklahoma City, and up north to KC.” Randy Frazer, city manager of Ark City, said that expansion of the Heartland Flyer would “provide a convenient optional mode of travel to the north, south, east and west of the country.” Amtrak service to Wichita and Cowley County was discontinued in 1979.
Source: Cowley CourierTraveler
