The Borealis, a mid-day Amtrak train from the downtown St. Paul Union Depot to Chicago, launched in late May following decades of advocacy by rail fans eager to see a second train roll out daily after the storied, but often delayed, Empire Builder. The Twin Cities-Milwaukee-Chicago corridor has proven popular, with preliminary figures showing more than 18,500 riders hopping aboard in the first month alone.

That’s an average of about 300 daily passengers in each direction, which Amtrak officials called a promising showing given that peak summer travel season is still to come. Nationally, Amtrak is on track, so to speak, to set a new all-time passenger record, with more travelers embracing rail in the post-pandemic era.

“With strong college and university markets on this route, we are confident Borealis will continue to perform well when students and staff travel in greater numbers this fall,” said Ray Lang, vice president with Amtrak State Supported Service, in a written statement.

Shorter trips

Ramsey County Commissioner Rafael Ortega, the longstanding chair of the county’s Regional Railroad Authority, said Monday that he’s received interest from far afield in copying the initial success of the Borealis with additional rail lines, though he would not disclose from where.

“People are already interested in coming into the Union Depot from different parts of the country,” Ortega said. “I think we’re going to get a third train after a while. They called me. I’ve already attended a meeting. It’s so preliminary, it’s just kind of talk now, but it’s good talk.”

As for ridership on the Borealis, “based on the very first day’s numbers, I’m not surprised,” Ortega said. “I think it’s going to go higher. A lot of people are taking these shorter trips to see family or a jazz festival in Red Wing and LaCrosse, (Wis.).”

A 39-route vision

In May 2021, Amtrak issued a 13-page “corridor vision” report that called for introducing new stations in over half of all U.S. states within 10 to 15 years. The report called for increasing rail service to 47 out of the country’s top 50 metropolitan areas and improving 25 existing routes, while adding 39 new routes. In addition to the Borealis, rail fans have advocated for the Northern Lights Express (NLX), a proposed higher-than-normal speed passenger rail project that would connect Minneapolis and Duluth, though Duluth would be a much smaller population site than Chicago.

Passengers have expressed excitement about the long-awaited Borealis, which leaves St. Paul at 11:50 a.m. and arrives in the Windy City around 7:15 p.m., with tickets starting at $41 one-way. A return trip from Chicago drops passengers in St. Paul at 6:30 p.m.

That said, rail fans have noted that the corridor skips a key destination — Madison, Wis.

Built in the late 1980s, the state-leased Horizon trains require stairway boarding and offer limited business seating and no baggage car, so bicycles are not yet allowed. Minnesota officials have called the possibility of leasing or buying newer train cars a strong possibility as service matures.

It is unclear what percentage of Borealis ridership travels between Chicago and Milwaukee, where the Borealis has replaced one of the Hiawatha’s daily round-trips, as opposed to the St. Paul-to-Milwaukee segment, where the Borealis mirrors the route of the Empire Builder.

Some rail fans have speculated that Borealis ridership may get the occasional boost heading eastbound due to the frequent lateness of the Empire Builder, which is scheduled to depart from the St. Paul Union Depot at 8:50 a.m. daily but has been known to roll out as many as five hours late due to congestion on freight tracks.

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A motorist charged Monday with hitting a 65-year-old woman on the side of a Maplewood road and leaving the scene was driving without a license at the time of the fatal 2022 crash, according to authorities.

Adrianee Laruth Powell-Onwuji, 38, of St. Paul, faces criminal vehicular homicide in connection with the collision that killed Eri Nakamura of Oakdale. She was charged by summons and remained out of custody Tuesday.

Adrianee Laruth Powell-Onwuji (Courtesy of the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office)

She declined to comment on the charge when reached by phone Tuesday. “I just found out about it this morning,” she said.

A Minnesota Department of Public Safety spokesman said Tuesday that Powell-Onwuji’s license has been either suspended or revoked since April 2011, and that it’s currently revoked.

Nakamura had been walking south on the shoulder of Century Avenue (Minnesota Highway 120) near Fifth Street when she was struck around 7:35 p.m. Feb. 6, 2022, according to the Minnesota State Patrol’s incident report.

A day after the crash, the state patrol asked for the public’s help in identifying the suspect’s vehicle, which they said was a 2015 to 2020 silver Mitsubishi sport-utility vehicle with damage to the front and driver’s side.

The state patrol announced the next day that a tip led investigators to the SUV and the suspected driver, who was not named. Charges were pending, the state patrol said at the time.

Mark Haase, a spokesman for the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office, said Tuesday that it took time to bring charges against Powell-Onwuji because of the crash reconstruction and that investigators had to collect evidence related to her claim that damage to her SUV was unrelated to the fatal collision.

She’d been at a bar

Officers sent to the crash scene found Nakamura in the road surrounded by drivers who had stopped to help her. She was taken to Regions Hospital and died in the emergency room.

The drivers had moved silver parts of a front bumper and a fog light assembly from the road to the shoulder. Officers determined the parts at the scene belonged to a Mitsubishi.

A state patrol investigator received a tip from an unidentified caller about a driving complaint involving a silver Mitsubishi SUV that had front-end damage, according to the criminal complaint. The caller gave the investigator the license plate information, which showed the SUV was registered to Powell-Onwuji.

Troopers found Powell-Onwuji’s SUV at her St. Paul apartment building in the 300 block of Winthrop Street South, just west of McKnight Road. It had damage to the driver’s side front quarter panel and it was missing parts similar to the ones found at the crash site, the complaint says.

Troopers went to Powell-Onwuji’s workplace. She told them she had met a friend at Titan’s Sports Saloon at 1267 Geneva Ave. N. in Oakdale the night of the crash.

Powell-Onwuji said her friend was arrested for drunken driving shortly after leaving the bar and that her SUV was damaged while trying to push her friend’s vehicle. She said she got home around 8 p.m.

Powell-Onwuji did not recall hitting anyone. She was arrested. While being taken to jail, she said “something to the effect that she should have realized she had hit something,” the complaint says.

The parts recovered from the crash scene match the parts missing from her SUV, according to the complaint.

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