(The Erwin Record published the following story by Doug Janz on August 26.)
ERWIN, Tenn. — A resolution passed earlier this year by the Unicoi County Commission has led CSX Transportation to refuse public parking on its property for this fall’s Unicoi County Apple Festival.
If nothing is resolved by festival time in October, festival officials agree Erwin will have a major increase in parking and traffic problems near Exit 18, especially for vendors who normally use the CSX railroad property off Second Street as their parking area.
The conflict stems from the county commission’s non-binding resolution in March that urged CSX not to use remote-control switching devices on its railroad tracks, saying that replacing live engineers with machines was a safety issue. That resolution was made based on information from the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers.
CSX insists the remote-control method is actually safer than using conventional engineers, and that much of the rest of the industry has already made the transition to the new technology.
The matter came back to the forefront last week in a big way when CSX denied the Unicoi County Chamber of Commerce’s request for permission to use the property near Second Street for festival parking. The parking lot in question is the closest and one of the largest parking areas for the Apple Festival.
CSX has provided the property for festival parking at no charge to the Chamber for years.
The CSX letter to the Chamber read: “In the past, we have been happy to authorize public parking on our property for the Apple Festival, but since the County Commission has taken official actions to question the safety of our operations, we do not feel that it would be appropriate to have members of the public parking in the vicinity of those operations.”
Members of the county commission and CSX did not show signs of changing their opposing positions on the issue. Meanwhile, the Town of Erwin and the Chamber of Commerce made it clear they had not endorsed the commission’s viewpoint.
“Most importantly, this is going to hurt the Apple Festival,” Erwin Mayor Russell Brackens said. “The city did not pass a resolution on that, and the Apple Festival is a city function.”
Another issue at stake is the donations raised for the Southside Volunteer Fire Department from manning the CSX parking lot. Jimmy Erwin is in a unique position in that he is a member of the Southside Fire Department and a county commissioner.
Erwin said the fire department could lose about $3,000 from working the parking lot and would scramble to find other fund-raising means if CSX closes the area.
“They can do that; it’s their property,” Erwin said. “It’ll cause more of a traffic jam. We’ll have to route all traffic to exit 15 to take the load off. It won’t be easy. But they’ll (CSX) have to man the place and block it off to keep people out.
“My vote as a commission was for safety, and I don’t see the commission going back and changing it. Any time you take a person from behind the wheel (train engineers), you have more of a chance of error.”
As for the loss of parking donations to the fire department, Erwin said, “If they choose not to let the fire department use it, we just have to back up, replan, and overcome. The fire department will not hold a grudge at all about it.”
Lyle Key, CSX regional vice-president, said the company was responding to what it feld was the community’s viewpoing on the safety of the area.
“We didn’t think it was a good idea to have public parking here,” Key said, adding that CSX was “shocked and disappointed by the resolution.”
“We put on a demonstration (for the commission) that it’s a safe technique,” he said, “and we exhibited data that showed the accident rate declined 60 percent over using crews. We asked to be notified if they needed any more information.
“For a county body to pass this resolution about this new technology is akin to them doing something like years ago saying, ‘We don’t think you should switch to diesel locomotives: we need to keep using steam engines.'”
Key said the United Transportation Union supports the remote-control devices, add that, “The resolution was not about safety, it was about a dispute over jobs between two railroad unions.”
The commission’s resolution state that, “the legislative body is aware there are significant safety problems relating to the movement of rail cars through remote control devices.”
County Commissioner Glenn Runnion said he stands behind the resolution, and considers the parking ban a retaliation for the commission’s action.
“But they have that prerogative,” he said. “Perhaps they’re correct in their assumption. If they don’t want public parking on their property, maybe it’s best.
“Our resolution is nonbinding. We went along with some other governing bodies who felt this wasn’t safe. I don’t think the board will change its mind. Once we’ve passed a resolution, I doubt we’ll go back.”
The Chamber of Commerce hopes a new resolution will be made — to the parking problem.
“We hope CSX reconsiders this,” Bennett-Hensley said, “because CSX has always had an excellent relationship with the Chamber of Commerce.
“Our point to CSX is simple: the county commission’s decision to pass the resolution was something the Chamber had no control over, and the commission has no control over the Apple Festival. Knowing that the two bodies are separate, we hope CSX will reconsider.”