SOUTH BEND — To cut down on increasingly congested and polluted highways, Uncle Sam wants more of us to ride the rails.

It's part of President Obama's plan to speed up America's economic recovery. Earlier this year, he announced $33 billion over the next five years in American Recovery Act money will go toward high-speed rail, calling it smart transportation equal to the needs of the 21st Century.

"It's a system that reduces travel times and increases mobility,” Obama said in April. “A system that reduces congestion and boosts productivity. A system that reduces destructive emissions and creates jobs."

The White House proposed 10 new routes coast to coast. The Chicago to Cleveland connection would run right through Northern Indiana.

"It'll be good,” said Rick Peterson, while waiting for an Amtrak train to Chicago. “The more people you get back to work building things the better off you are. It takes people to build trains just like it takes people to buy cars."

But the plan isn't exactly on the fast track. There's still no finalized route. The originally-proposed route would run through Warsaw, Plymouth, and Fort Wayne, with potential stops in each city.

But Indiana's Department of Transportation has applied for $49 million to study the feasibility of all possible routes, including an alternative that would run through South Bend and Elkhart.

As for an answer on where this proposed route will go and when, don't hold your breath. There are more proposed routes than there is funding and If this route is awarded grant money, the state says a feasibility study would take two or three years. Only then would plans begin to actually build the rail line. There's no official word on how long that would take.