The Lake Cities was a passenger train operated by the Erie Railroad and successor Erie Lackawanna Railway between Chicago and New Jersey termini — first, Jersey City and later Hoboken. The Lake Cities began in 1939 as the Midlander, a Jersey City-Chicago service with sections to Cleveland, Ohio, and Buffalo, New York. From its eastern terminus, the Erie's Pavonia Terminal in Jersey City, the route ran through Port Jervis to Binghamton over the traditional Erie main line through Sullivan and Orange County in New York's Southern Tier and on to Chicago. Unlike other New York-Chicago trains, it bypassed Buffalo to the south, running through Jamestown, Youngstown, Akron and Marion.