The South Shore Line runs Chicago to South Bend, Indiana (my birthplace!) and has operated since the 1910s. Running on a mainline railroad, down the middle of streets, next to a freeway; through the very centre of Chicago, in a sprawling industrial wasteland, by small towns, forest, rural farmlands and even through a National Park, the South Shore Line is the very last traditional electric interurban railroad in North America- a strange survivor of what were once hundreds of systems with thousands of miles of track all across the country, but which eventually succumbed to buses, freeways, and America's car culture. The South Shore managed to hang on all those years, and today is a very successful, busy line serving both city commuters and intercity passengers alike. Here, an eastbound train squeezes down the middle of 11th Street in Michigan City, Indiana on a damp February afternoon. Drivers here are used to the train in the middle of the street, and accidents are actually rare.