Millennials learn about nation, themselves on cross-country trip

Tapping into a yearning among young people for better ways of learning and communicating, a former financial analyst left his Wall Street job to start the Millennial Trains Project. Now in its fourth year, the nonprofit puts dozens of young people from around the United States and the world onto vintage train cars to explore the country and talk to one another about what they've seen.

Tapping into a yearning among young people for better ways of learning and communicating, a former financial analyst left his Wall Street job to start the Millennial Trains Project. Now in its fourth year, the nonprofit puts dozens of young people from around the United States and the world onto vintage train cars to explore the country and talk to one another about what they've seen.

"We're trying to give participants a real, visceral sense of the scale of our country and build a transregional perspective," said Patrick Dowd, 29, MTP's founder and CEO. "We look at this as an inner journey and an outer journey — the inner journey is about how our participants are growing at an individual level."

This year, the project doubled to two train trips, with two diverse groups of 26 travelers, including participants from Germany, Peru and Singapore. The first trip started in Pittsburgh last week and went through Chicago, Kansas City, Mo., and Albuquerque, N.M., before ending in Los Angeles on Sunday. The second starts Wednesday in LA and goes through San Francisco, Denver, Milwaukee and Detroit.

The young people on board, who raised money mostly through crowdfunding to pay for their $5,000 tickets, include recent college graduates, grad students and those a few years into their careers. The State Department also sends a contingent of foreign Fulbright scholars. At each stop, they got to meet as a group with local leaders — including Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto and Chicago city Treasurer Kurt Summers on the most recent trip.

They then get to go off on their own to meet specialists in their fields of interest, ranging from designing playgrounds, planning museum programs, teaching financial literacy and promoting urban farming. Some have specific goals. Pittsburgh's Daniel Scullin is making a documentary about local food economies — while others are just there to learn.

Christopher Smith / Chicago Tribune

Adam Auxier of Minneapolis washes one of the three vintage train cars being used by the Millennial Trains Project at Union Station in Kansas City. One of the three vintage train cars is a Pullman car. The train is headed to Albuquerque next before finishing is trip to Los Angeles.

Adam Auxier of Minneapolis washes one of the three vintage train cars being used by the Millennial Trains Project at Union Station in Kansas City. One of the three vintage train cars is a Pullman car. The train is headed to Albuquerque next before finishing is trip to Los Angeles.

(Christopher Smith / Chicago Tribune)

After their city visits, they return to their train cars, which include a domed observation car and a Pullman sleeper, to eat regional food prepared by on-board chefs, attend seminars and lectures, and exchange ideas. It's a full day — starting at 6 a.m. and ending at 11 p.m.

Dowd said the goal of the trips is to build leaders and grow networks. A train is an ideal environment for community building because a cross-country observation car is like a "floating living room," where people can relax and talk, he said.

"Riding on an airplane or in a car is an anonymous and isolating experience," Dowd said. "Being on a plane eliminates the space to have a natural human conversation — two people having to look at each other and talk. We have an environment that's very conducive to creativity."

Riding along are MTP staff and mentors, including former participants. The cars are attached to Amtrak trains.

Dowd said he doesn't look at the trips as a business incubator — but participants do go on to start their own companies and other creative endeavors. One traveler started a business that turns misshapen fruit that gets rejected from grocery stores into juice, and others she had met on the MTP trip helped her out, Dowd said.

Another MTP traveler wrote clean energy legislation, using research from his journey.

"There are so many examples of people making connections that were helpful for their careers," Dowd said.

The idea for MTP came to Dowd while he was training to be a financial analyst on Wall Street in 2012. The Occupy movement was going on outside his office windows, noisily questioning his work. While Dowd didn't want to be an "occupier," he knew he wanted to do something besides juggle numbers.

"I wanted to do something I thought would be helpful," Dowd said.

He decided to try a U.S. version of a train tour he learned about while on a Fulbright scholarship in India. The tour, called the Jagriti Yatra, which means "journey of awakening" in Hindi, takes young people on a loop around the subcontinent.

Dowd said his peers are besieged by advertising and constant claims on their attention, which can distract them from getting anything done. He sees a train journey as being similar to practices like yoga or writing personal letters — a way to slow down, pay attention and act with intention.

"We're not all sitting in a row with our ear plugs in, watching an on-demand movie," he said. "We're talking."

Dowd said even the delays that come with Amtrak are educational — the fact that a train is held up by a freight carrying coal and oil tells something about the nation's history, and how things work.

One participant in this year's project is Rachel Reilly Carroll, 31, of Washington, D.C., who works for Enterprise Community Partners, a national nonprofit that finances affordable housing. Carroll wanted to look at the need to preserve and create affordable housing near transit.

On her journey last week, Carroll talked to residents in the gentrified East Liberty neighborhood in Pittsburgh, and with activists in Chicago's Wicker Park and Logan Square neighborhoods who fear being displaced by new, high-rise projects near "L" stops.

Carroll decided to take the trip because she could only learn so much "sitting at my desk behind a computer screen."

"It's a great opportunity for me to learn about different policies," Carroll told the Tribune while waiting for the next leg of her journey in Chicago's Union Station. "You really got to be on the ground and take a look for yourself."

Carroll said it's also important for people who want to understand the nation's problems to not just see the big cities — like New York and LA — or popular mid-sized spots like Austin, Texas, but also places like Kansas City and Detroit.

She said the trip has given her a chance to unplug from the online world and engage.

"You can't help but have conversations with people," she said. "I really wanted to take this opportunity to learn."

Those interested in next year's project can check it out at www.millennialtrain.co/participate/. The application fee is $50. Some participants receive fellowships from the project's lead sponsor, Comcast NBCUniversal.

Bike riding lessons for adults

Not everyone learns how to ride a bike as a kid, and not everyone who used to ride has tried it for a while.

To remedy this problem, the Chicago Department of Transportation has teamed up with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois, the sponsor of the Divvy bike share program, to offer free bike riding classes for adults.

Classes will be held in the evenings on the South and West sides — with Divvy providing use of bikes. Participants get a free bike helmet. Classes are open to children if space is available, but children will need to bring their own bikes, since Divvy does not allow riders younger than 16.

"Free adult riding classes are a natural fit with the city's efforts to get more people on bikes," said Sean Wiedel, CDOT assistant commissioner.

Classes started the last week of July and continue this week, Aug. 8-12 in the Garfield Workforce Center, 10 S. Kedzie.

Other classes will be held at Kennedy King College, 710 W. 65th St., Aug. 15-19, Aug. 22-29 and Aug. 29 to Sept. 2. All classes are from 6 to 8 p.m.

Another car-share option

In a column last month, a representative for the car-share program Zipcar said it has started offering a pay-by-the-mile option this summer, the first in the country.

It turns out Enterprise already had a per-mile option for its car-share program, which can be useful for short trips. It's a bit tricky to find on its website, but the option has been available in Chicago for two years, said spokeswoman Elin Nozewski.

Enterprise offers a "Keep it Local" plan that starts at $4 an hour, plus 40 cents per mile.

More Belmont/Western pain

Welcome to the hellscape also known as Phase 2 of the Western/Belmont/Clybourn project — and stay away if you can help it.

Beginning Monday through mid-November, east and westbound traffic on Belmont through that area will be restricted to a single through-lane, and left turns from Belmont onto Western will be prohibited, CDOT said.