Rail Solutions sees benefits to slumping economy

By CAITLIN SULLIVAN/Staff

A Virginia group that advocates expanding rail said the slumping economy might just be a good thing.
Less money for highway building and more interest in improving infrastructure and creating jobs could equal more room for rails, supporters say.
“I think one of the things that’s encouraging is there’s no longer much money for highway construction,” said Rail Solution Executive Director David Foster.
Rees Shearer, chair of the grassroots advocacy group, said the crisis in transportation funding could have some advantages. The justification for improving rail – fuel costs, pollution and future availability have only increased since 2003, when Rail Solution got its start.
“As we sit and wait to see where the money is going to come from, the advantages for rail will only increase,” he said.
Good news for the group began earlier this year with the January announcement that STAR Solutions, a group planning expansion and construction on Interstate 81, had pulled out.
“It’s kind of the beginning of a new era for us,” said Foster. “We’re now not fighting STAR Solutions everyday. Now we can direct our attention to more constructive efforts.”
More good news came earlier this month in the form of a six-state memorandum of understanding “to establish a seamless freight and passenger network along I-81 from New York to Tennessee.”
Shearer though is concerned that the memorandum doesn’t allow for citizen input, leaving the fate of the project to the six governmental bodies.
A feasibility study and action plan is set to be released soon said Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation’s Director of Rail Transportation Kevin Page. Page was available via a conference phone during the annual Rail Solutions meeting Saturday.
The study is part of the 2006 House Bill 1581 to determine if it makes sense to move long-haul, through-truck traffic to intermodal rail along the 81 corridor. The bill also incorporated a requirement to find out what is needed to divert 60 percent of the through-truck traffic to intermodal rail.
“The reason that we wrote in the goal for a 60 percent diversion for through trucks is because it would avoid additional cost to expand the highway,” Shearer said/
It’s that freight traffic, not passenger traffic, that’s overcapacity, overall, he said.
“There’s a long-term plan in place for an eight-lane interstate,” Shearer said. “Why build eight lanes for truck capacity, spend billions of dollars, have diesel pollution, eat up all kinds of land, plus from a national security standpoint rely on more oil? If you invest in pavement there is not going to be enough money in the world to build an eight lane interstate and a railroad. If you build the pavement you negate the option for improvement on the railroad.”
Shearer said facts and figures support an improved rail system, politics doesn’t.
“It’s the political will that makes the decision to invest in more and more roads that gives us less productivity or invest in rails that give us more productivity,” he said.
Washington State-based rail expert Hal Cooper said at the meeting that 9,600 cars does the same amount of damage to the road as one 40-ton truck.
In addition to lobbying local officials for support, Rail Solution is also looking bigger. A national rail system may even be favorable in this tight economic environment because it could create jobs and strengthen infrastructure.
“Although money is short there is going to be an imperative to put money into the economy and transportation will be high on that list,” he said.
Cooper said that when gas hit $4 a gallon and oil $120 a barrel, people’s thinking changed. They began look for alternatives.
California voters passed a high speed rail system plan in November, the first in the country.
“The Midwest will be next in maybe two years and then will come the Southeast,” Cooper said. “But that could be accelerated depending on the political system.”
Cooper said there’s a good prospect for an improved rail system in Virginia, but with all the different groups working for the rail system it may make it more difficult.
“There are quite a few groups, five I think,” he said. “Certainly you speak stronger with one voice than with five.”