Running from east to west the line was originally formed by the Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa Railroad. This railroad fell into the Chicago, Indiana and Southern railroad which was subsidized by the New York Central Railroad. The NYC held the line and it into the Penn Central era. When Penn Central went under and into Conrail the Conrail held this line as a bypass belt line around Chicago it always was. The line ultimately went to Norfolk Southern when Conrail was divided in the 1990s. The Belt line as it's called is technically called the Kankakee Branch. The Kankakee Line refers to a north south line that the Branch connects to at Schneider, IN. The Kankakee Branch which we are focusing on here runs from NIPSCO in Wheatfield, IN to Hennepin, IL. Along the way the line passes over the CSX Monon Sub at Shelby, IN; the Kankakee Line (ex-NYC Egyptian Line) at Schneider, IN; the UP Villa Grove Sub at Momence, IL; the CN Chicago Sub at Kankakee, IL; the UP Joliet Sub at Dwight, IL; and the BNSF Chillicothe Sub at Streator, IL. Click below to explore more on this line. Please note some links may lead to pages you can access via elsewhere on the site, this compensates for many topics which overlap. (i.e., Kankakee pages are interconnected like the railroads)