With the closure of Dearborn Station in 1971 and the Calumet steel mills in 1985, the railroad was gradually downgraded until 1994 when it became a subsidiary of the Union Pacific Corporation.

The alignment ran north from Dolton to the crossing of the Illinois Central Railroad just south of its junction with the Michigan Central Railroad at Kensington, then continued northwest and north, eventually coming along the west side of the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway (PRR) at 47th Street.

Then it continued north to cross the PFW&C and head northeast at Alton Junction, crossing the St. Charles Air Line Railroad and Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railway before turning back north the rest of the way to Dearborn Station.

Connections were immediately provided with the newly built Wabash, St. Louis and Pacific Railway at 74th Street and Chicago and Grand Trunk Railway at 49th Street, which, along with the Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad connection at the south end at Dolton, were the three initial lessees of the line.

The State Line and Indiana City Railroad later gave the Wabash, St. Louis and Pacific Railway a second access point to the C&WI at Hammond, and a sixth railroad — the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway — used Dearborn Station, but used its own line on the east side of the C&EI from Alton Junction to the station.

The branches to Cragin and South Chicago (the latter east of Hammond Junction only) were leased in 1883 to the newly formed Belt Railway of Chicago, which was also given trackage rights over the C&WI's main line and branch to Hammond Junction.

This service is the successor to the single pair of suburban trains operated by the Wabash (and later Norfolk and Western Railroad) over the C&WI.