(The following appeared on the Business First of Louisville website on February 17, 2010.)
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The state of Kentucky Wednesday was awarded $17.6 million in federal stimulus funds to rehabilitate short-line railroads owned by R.J. Corman Railroad Group.
Short-line railroads are small freight railroads that provide businesses with a link to larger Class I railroad carriers such as CSX, Norfolk Southern and Burlington Northern Santa Fe.
The railroad lines are located in Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia. The rehabilitation project is expected to create 100 jobs, according to a news release from Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear’s office.
The grant was awarded through the federal Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) program funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.
“This project will improve the transportation infrastructure of a three-state section of Appalachia, as well as create badly needed jobs,” Beshear said in the release.
The state of Kentucky will contribute $200,000 toward the project, the release said.
Nicholasville, Ky.-based R.J. Corman will invest $3 million in the project.
In Kentucky, Corman will rehabilitate 200 miles of track at the cost of $13 million. The tracks serve 81 customers and support more than 28,500 outbound carloads of aluminum, sand and other goods annually, the release said.
Corman operates a lined between Louisville and Shelbyville, Ky., and between Shelbyville and Frankfort, Ky. It also operates a line between Clermont, Ky., and Bardstown, Ky.