(The Billings Gazette posted the following Associated Press article on its website on April 8.)
LEWISTOWN, Mont. — City and county officials here have signed off on a tentative plan they hope will retain rail service to Lewistown, but with changes that would include eliminating the route through town in favor of service to a central industrial park.
Lewistown’s lumber mill closed in August, and Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway’s other two customers, the Pacific Steel and Recycling, and the Central Montana Co-op grain elevator, appear to use the rails only sporadically.
The Lewistown route has been closed since early March for maintenance, and BNSF has indicated it may want to shut down the route for good, citing safety concerns and a shrinking customer base.
Though the railroad hasn’t formally filed for abandonment, it did target the tracks for potential abandonment on documents it is required to file each year with federal officials.
Under a preliminary plan that Lewistown and Fergus County say they’ve reached with the state Department of Transportation, the DOT will provide up to $2 million in federal highway funds to establish an industrial park on the western edge of town, if the railroad agrees to provide rail service to the park for five years.
BNSF would run trains from its main line roughly 40 miles west of Lewistown near Moccasin to the industrial park. That would allow it to close its winding route through Lewistown, which includes 30 crossings near schools and residential neighborhoods.
The plan also could allow the DOT to eventually remove a high-maintenance highway overpass over BNSF’s existing track.
Supporters of the plan say if the city and county can develop a base of railroad customers at the park, the community could preserve rail service to the area.
“Once the railroad leaves, once the tracks are torn out, the chance of ever getting railroad service again is none,” City Manager Kevin Myhre said. “Where it affects us mostly is in future growth. If you don’t have railroad service, you are limited in the availability of assets you can use to draw business to your community.”
Burlington Northern has not made any formal commitment yet.
But Pat Keim, the railroad’s government relations director in Helena, has sent the county a letter expressing the railroad’s intent to provide service to the industrial park for five years, said County Commissioner Vern Petersen.
City Commissioner Karl Gies said he reluctantly voted to proceed with the plan.
“I think we’re being shortchanged,” Gies said. “The world is full of designated vacant industrial parks. I don’t see that as any immediate economic benefit to this area.”
Under the plan the city and county approved this month, the Montana DOT would buy 322 acres near the airport for the industrial park. The department also would install a well at the site.If the park doesn’t materialize, the land could be sold and the profits invested in another economic development venture.
In the meantime, the land can be leased to a farmer to generate income, said County Commissioner Vern Petersen.