(The following story by David Quigg and David Wickert was published in today’s online Tacoma News Tribune)
TACOMA, Wash. — By the end of March, freight trains might no longer roll through the University of Washington Tacoma campus.
Sound Transit said Thursday that it has reached an “agreement in principle” with the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway to shut down a 2.1-mile stretch of track.
This would eliminate a major logistical challenge for the Tacoma Link streetcar line Sound Transit is building: how to devise a safe way for streetcar and freight tracks to intersect at South 17th Street and Pacific Avenue.
Sound Transit stood to spend $2.2 million satisfying federal safety requirements at the intersection, said light-rail director Ahmad Fazel. But BNSF offered something different last month, Sound Transit said. For a payment of $2 million, the railroad would shut down the line and divert trains to tracks between Lakeview and Nisqually.
Gus Melonas, a spokesman for BNSF, said little Thursday: “I would just say that it’s presently under review and discussion. That’s where it stands.”
Sound Transit officials expected a final deal by now. They included the agreement on a board committee’s agenda Thursday. Ultimately, they pulled it from the agenda, saying a deal should be ready next Thursday.
“Our attorneys and their attorneys were working out the details,” Fazel said.
The tracks that would be closed carry just a handful of slow-moving trains. But they offer a ride through history. They follow the original Northern Pacific route to Puget Sound.
“From the standpoint of the history, it’s kind of something that I hate to see go,” Tacoma architect Jim Merritt said Thursday upon learning of the potential closure.
For 20-some years, Merritt has done business close enough to the line to have passing trains drown out phone conversations. Since he’d like to see the history of the line preserved, he wouldn’t want buildings to pop up in the old right of way.
But he understands why streetcars and freight could have trouble co-existing.
“Some years back, I saw a runaway freight car come careening through there,” he said. “And it was shocking to me. This thing went flying through there about 50 mph.”
A collision between a streetcar and a freight train would be “worse than gut-wrenching,” he said.
UW Tacoma spokesman Mike Wark said many consider the railroad part of the unique character of the campus.
“People can certainly tell when it comes through,” Wark said.
But he said, “It hasn’t been a negative for us.”
UW Tacoma included a bridge over the track when it built its science building.
“When you’re in a hurry and the train goes by, we won’t have to worry about that,” he said.
Michael Runyon, who works with Merritt in the neighborhood, grew up in a railroad family. He would miss the trains.
“Wherever there’s the rail is sort of where the heart is,” he said. “I know a lot of people want to gentrify things. But there’s something nice about having to stop for a train every once in a while.”