(The following story by Kaija Wilkinson appeared on the Press-Register website on February 10, 2009.)
MOBILE, Ala. — Work crews have demolished a train trestle on a CSX Corp. Inc. main line at Catfish Bayou that burned Saturday afternoon and materials are being delivered to rebuild it, Gary Sease, a Jacksonville, Fla.-based CSX spokesman, said Monday. CSX anticipates a two-week rebuilding period, he said, in line with its original estimate.
Sease said CSX initially believed the fire burned a swing-span bridge at Bayou Sara, but that was not the case. The bridge at Catfish Bayou, about three-tenths of a mile northeast of Bayou Sara, is a standard, 312-foot-long structure.
Sease declined to say what it would cost to rebuild the bridge. CSX will also have to deal with costs as its reroutes traffic from the line, he said.
CSX customers that used the line to ship items like building materials, consumer products and commodities through Mobile are being shifted to other rail lines, Sease said. The bridge work is expected to affect as many as 18 trains daily in Mobile, according to CSX.
“We made similar adjustments when the line was impacted by Hurricane Katrina,” Sease said, adding that CSX has gotten “great cooperation” from other rail lines.
“Thanks to them, this is not going to have a great impact on our ability to deliver freight.”
Jimmy Lyons, director of the Alabama State Port Authority, said the schedule shifts could cause rail traffic-flow problems at the state docks, but the docks has not yet seen any effect. Some CSX rail users, he said, could shift their cargo to barge.
Sease said the cause of the fire remains under investigation.