They didn't arrive in Portage by train, and they didn't have the shelter of a depot available when light rain began to dampen their placards.

But there they were Wednesday afternoon in Goodyear Park - about a dozen university students marching and chanting, "What do we want? High-speed rail. When do we want it? Now."

Student members of the Wisconsin Public Interest Research Group are on a tour of Wisconsin communities that have been proposed as stops for a 110-mph high-speed rail system, and Portage was their eighth stop Wednesday afternoon.

With Portage's extensive railroad history, said recent University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate Tony Uhl, high-speed rail is a way to join the city's past and future.

"Think of being able to get to Chicago or Minneapolis, with Portage right in the middle," he said. "And with high-speed rail, you can get there without congested airways or unsafe highways."

Portage is now a stop for Amtrak's Empire Builder, a passenger train that runs between Chicago and Seattle or Portland, Ore., with stops in cities such as St. Paul, Minn., and Fargo, N.D. The Empire Builder, which travels about 80 mph, stops in Portage only once a day for each direction of travel.

High-speed rail would offer six or seven trips a day, all with stops in Portage, for people headed southeast toward Chicago or northwest toward the Twin Cities, said Bruce Speight, WISPIRG director.

As part of President Barack Obama's $787 billion stimulus package, $8 billion has been proposed for adding new high-speed rail. Gov. Jim Doyle has put in for some of this money to bring high-speed rail to Wisconsin - to cities already served by Amtrak, such as Milwaukee and La Crosse, with additional stops in Appleton, Oshkosh, Brookfield, Oconomowoc and Madison.

Speight said local officials have been invited to join the WISPIRG group at each of the cities it has visited. An invitation was extended to Portage Mayor Ken Jahn, he said.

Jahn said later in the day that he had expected a group of high-speed rail supporters to give a news conference Wednesday at City Hall, and was there waiting for them.

Had he connected with the WISPIRG group, Jahn said, he would have added his voice of support for high-speed rail - a view that he has expressed in the past.

"It's a green initiative," he said. "To have a route from Chicago to St. Paul is a natural for Portage, with Amtrak service already here."

Jahn said he has not been involved in any discussions about possible costs to the city to build a high-speed rail system here. If structures such as a depot would be needed, he said, the railroad likely would pay for that, not the city. All the city would need to do is provide public transit, such as taxi service, to and from the station - and that's already available.

Devin Trezise of Middleton, a recent UW-Madison graduate, held up a map showing the proposed high-speed routes through nine states.

The blue line on the map that ran through Portage indicated an area where the train would travel as fast as 110 mph.

Trezise has experienced trains this fast. He's been to China several times, and soon plans to go back there to teach English as a second language.

"They have an excellent train system in China," he said. "You can get to any city you want, with no delays."

Speight said high-speed rail is intended to offer an alternative to car travel and air travel for destinations that are about 500 miles away. Trains, he said, use less energy, and create less greenhouse gas, than cars or planes.

With trains traveling at 110 mph, a trip from Madison to the Twin Cities would take about 3 1/2 hours. According to Amtrak timetables, the trip from Portage to the Twin Cities takes about five hours.

Uhl noted that high-speed rail is projected to raise property values in the city of Portage by about $14 million, and to create about 195 new permanent jobs in Portage - not counting the jobs that would be created for the construction of the rail system and the trains.

More importantly, Uhl said, high-speed rail will make communities such as Portage more attractive to graduates from the University of Wisconsin system, many of whom are looking for high-tech work, and reliable public transportation, in larger cities outside the state.

"Wherever I'm going when I get a job," he said, "I want it to be a place where I don't need to own a car."

Students in Wisconsin Dells today

Student members of the Wisconsin Public Interest Research Group will be at the Amtrak station in Wisconsin Dells at 10 a.m. today to continue advocating for high-speed rail in Wisconsin. The station is located at 100 La Crosse St. State Rep. Fred Clark, D-Baraboo, is expected to attend the event, said Bruce Speight, WISPIRG director.

ljerde@capitalnewspapers.com

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