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Norfolk Southern Slams Brakes On Red Line
Local rail-transit cheerleaders have for years been shaking their pom-poms trying to gin up support for the half-billion dollar Red Line, a 25-mile commuter rail project slated to run from uptown Charlotte to Mooresville. They’ve cooked-up multiple studies to show the purported economic and social benefits the Red Line would produce; held public forums stacked with rail proponents to pressure elected officials for support; rolled out allegedly objective transit experts to sing a veritable chorus of Red Line praises.
Elected officials, with the notable exception of some sensible folks up in Iredell County, have been all too willing to swallow the pitch – hook, line and sinker, without stopping to examine the proposed project on its merits instead of its hype.
Here’s the reality: the project as currently proposed is DOA from jump street. At least according to ranking officials with Norfolk Southern, which owns the tracks the Red Line would run on. In a letter sent this week to the N.C. Department of Transportation’s deputy secretary for transit, Norfolk Southern minces no words in their assessment of the project, which they consider “fatally flawed”:
We have followed with interest and concern the recent campaign to introduce “Red Line” commuter service on the Norfolk Southern-owned rail line between Charlotte and Mooresville. Norfolk Southern stands ready to study with NCDOT and CATS the introduction of commuter rail service on the Norfolk Southern O Line. Although I cannot now anticipate the eventual conclusions of such a study, Norfolk Southern commits to ensuring that any new study is based upon realistic operating, financial and regulatory assumptions.
Having said that, Norfolk Southern cannot support the current “Red Line” plan as proposed by NCDOT for use of Norfolk Southern’s property. The “Red Line” plan is fatally flawed and based upon assumptions about the projected freight use of the O Line that are no longer valid. For those reasons, the current proposal is not feasible and does not constitute a starting point for further discussions. The JPA development process, therefore, is premature and will not lead to an accelerated construction schedule.
The letter reiterates concerns from earlier this year, when Norfolk Southern officials raised myriad questions about a Red Line project that they already considered “fundamentally incompatible” with the railroad titan’s future use of the line and its ability to expand their business in North Carolina. The latest missive to state officials, and its stronger language of dissent, makes clear in no uncertain terms Norfolk Southern considers the track that the Red Line is headed down a dead end.
In a rational world, that should be enough to slam the brakes on this project from moving forward. Charlotte Area Transit System and their uptown rail-transit boosters, however, do not live in a rational world. For proof look no further than the repeated warnings of gross cost overruns that plagued the McCrory Blue Line light rail, and the summary dismissals of any reality-based facts that followed in their wake.
It would be nice to think that local transit boosters and elected officials have learned their lessons, at an exorbitant cost to taxpayers, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
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Short URL: http://pundithouse.com/?p=8772
the promoters of the light rail scam will call this bargaining by NSRR
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You hit it on the head. A link to the response from NCDOT can be found here…Norfolk Southern Flexes Its Muscle.
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[...] So once again, as pointed out by pundithouse.com, Norfolk Southern is sending letters. [...]
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If McCrory is elected, all of NC will be covered in light rail lines….well at least all of the land in NC that is owned by the folks who fund his (and his cronies) campaigns. Then his funders will not only be paid for the worthless land, they will then be paid by local and state government entities to build low income housing boondoggles which will be supplemented by an obligatory spattering of arenas and recreational centers which will be decorated by overpriced, underwhelming “art” pieces…..I’m envisioning things like big round discs of concrete…oh wait, that’s already been done!!!
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according to a report issued this month by the NC State Tres. office, if the state takes on anymore debt, they are putting their AAA rating at risk. McCrory, much as he loves to waste money on things like trains etc, would never let that happen.
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Right….because we all know that when Republicans control, oh say the Presidency and the Congress that spending comes to a screeching halt…..
Don’t forget, the two parties, and their politicians, are not concerned with doing what is right, they are only concerned with having control so they get to choose what our money gets spent on.
I’ll bet anyone anything that the size of NC government is larger post-McCrory than pre-McCrory.
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[...] So once again, as pointed out by pundithouse.com, Norfolk Southern is sending letters. [...]
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Just had another one of those common sense ignorant simplistic Joe six-pack thoughts.
In rare occasions GOVCO has led development with location of new roads, but for the majority of the time it appears GOVCO struggles to react to development and growth and is often 10-20 years slow in building new roads or upgrading existing roads.
Bottom line encourage the development FIRST that will pay for the Red Line and then build it once the tax bases actually exists that pays for it. The risk in the plan is on those gambling investment money on the future construction of the line, rather than the risk being on tax payers having to foot the bill for an pre-built rail line that little development shows up to pay for……
Just how I would rule the world if someone was foolish enough to make me king…..
Oh…and just how “compatible” is medium to light rail with freight rail? Generally folks don’t want to live on or near a freight train rail line due to the noise and vibration. I seem to remember folk in the South End and CATS petitioning GOVCO for the ability to silence the horn and bells on the Blue Line….the LR was just too noisy to live beside. Just wait until folks try to live beside N&S engines and freight trains thundering by…..
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