Is Chicago Union Station owned and operated by an independent terminal corporation, as many of the larger stations once were, or does it now belong to Chicago's METRA?

Neither one. It is owned and operated by Amtrak.Don C.

Chicago Union Station Company is a separate corporate entity but its stock is entirely owned by Amtrak. Metra and various food vendors are tenants. I believe that BNSF and CN/IC are also tenants, as they provided services under contract to Metra. The biggest money maker for the company may be from air-rights revenues. The eight floors of offices in the headhouse are vacant.

On the other hand I believe it was at one time owned by a private corporation which was in turn owned by tenant railroads. (I forget just which roads. I know CB&Q and Chicago and Alton had shares, I believe CMStP&P was merely a tenant.) Presumably they each let their share go to Amtrak when they got out of the passenger biz. (My info is from a DPM article that I have at home, but not on me.) In any case, Amtrak does indeed own it now. It seems that they tended to get out of Union Stations where they had to pay rent real fast. Witness St. Louis, which was owned by the TRRA into the eighties, some ten years after Amtrak vacated the premises. Chicago Union was probably easier to divest since it wasn't owned by one of the major Chicago terminals (IHB, or BeltRyOfChi for instance) thus eliminating the messy entanglements of divesting stuff from a private company (terminals have to my knowledge generally not been public, since the owning railroads like to keep control) which you wanted to otherwise keep for the freight connections (like the TRRA). SincerelyDavid Ackerman

Chicago Union Station Company (“CUSCO”) was owned 50% by PRR/PC (representing equal shares by the Ft. Wayne and Panhandle); 25% by the CB&Q/BN; and 25% by the CMStP&P. The C&A/GM&O/ICG were tenants, as was briefly, the Chicago & Evanston. After Amtrak acquired the PC and CMStP&P shares from thier respective bankruptcy estates, the BN was left with a minority interest which they quickly sold. Here’s the mystery. An urban legend states that about a dozen years ago, the Field Museum notified Amtrak that it had several massive benches from Union Station. They had been given to the Museum about many years prior. Amtrak repurchased them sight unseen. When they arrived on Amtrak property, it became apparent that they were from another depot. Since the Field museum opened in the late 1920’s, about the time the original Union Depot was torn down in 1926, we may surmise that the benches were from that structure. Supposedly Amtrak shipped these high-backed walnut benches for use at a depot in Florida. Does anyone have a clue as to where they are now?