(The following appeared on the Bellingham Herald website on May 13, 2011.)
BELLINGHAM, Wash. — Trains headed for SSA Marine’s proposed new shipping terminal at Cherry Point would get there via Bellingham, not the South Fork Valley, a BNSF Railway Co. spokeswoman said Thursday, May 12.
Bellingham Mayor Dan Pike and other city residents had suggested that trains full of Rocky Mountain coal or other cargoes could bypass Bellingham and reach the Gateway Pacific Terminal site by way of the South Fork line. That would require routing the trains over existing track along Highway 9 to the border at Sumas and then through Canada, or the construction of a new rail link west from Lynden to the existing main line at Custer.
Suann Lundsberg, in BNSF’s Fort Worth office, said neither alternative to Bellingham appears practical to railway officials.
The only way to do that is to make sure that the impact of rail traffic on Bellingham is considered in the environmental impact statement process, Pike said. Once negative impacts have been substantiated, SSA or the railroad could be required to take steps to ease those impacts.
Full story: Bellingham Herald