(The following story by Tom Palmer appeared on The Lakeland Ledger website on October 5.)
BARTOW, Fla. — CSX officials will have to deal with endangered species and traffic impacts to get approval for a planned Winter Haven rail freight terminal, according to a preliminary summary of the project submitted Thursday to the Central Florida Regional Planning Council.
The preliminary application, which will be the subject of a meeting Oct. 15 at Nora Mayo Hall in Winter Haven, covers only the 318-acre first phase of the project on land recently purchased by Evansville Western Railway of Paducah, Ky., a CSX affiliate, from Winter Haven for $7 million.
CSX Real Property of Jacksonville is the applicant for approval of the development of regional impact, which will be reviewed by the regional planning council, Winter Haven and the Florida Department of Community Affairs.
Highlights of the 25-page report:
The site contains more than 30 active gopher tortoise burrows, and those burrows may contain additional protected species.
The site contains other protected wildlife – sand skinks and Florida scrub jays – as well as endangered plant species.
An active bald eagle nest is adjacent to the site.
The site contains 46 acres of wetlands.
The project will trigger the need to study the portion of State Road 60 between Lake Wales and Bartow, portions of U.S. 98 in Bartow and U.S. 27 in Lake Wales, and Rifle Range Road from SR 60 to Bomber Road.
Access to and from the property will be via an extension of Pollard Road to SR 60, which Winter Haven plans to build by 2009, when the terminal is scheduled to open.
The proposed development would not contain any facilities where hazardous materials will be generated or used.
There is no mention of the development of the surrounding land for an industrial park that was part of a 1,250-acre project announced early last year. That is the anticipated second phase of the project.
“That’s what we always intended,” said CSX spokesman Ron Morrow.
Morrow said it’s hard to apply for a DRI for the second phase because no one knows what kind of development the rail freight terminal would attract.
“It’s foggy when you start looking at that,” he said.
Morrow said the second phase, which would be developed by someone else, would have the biggest development impact because it would attract the bulk of the jobs and generate most of the traffic.
“CSX is not a developer,” he said.
He said the company still has an option on the remainder of the property until 2010, but if the rail corporation doesn’t exercise the option, another corporation could.
The development of the Winter Haven terminal is the result of CSX’s planned replacement of its facility in Taft in Orange County in connection with the establishment of 61 miles of commuter rail in the Orlando area.
The facility would employ 200 people and would operate 24 hours a day, except for 7 a.m. through 5 p.m. on Sundays, according to the report.