(The following article appeared on the Commercial Dispatch website on March 12, 2009.)
COLUMBUS, Miss. — The Lowndes County Port Authority soon will be seeking funding for its railway expansion project on the west bank of the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, Port Authority board members announced during a Tuesday meeting.
“That railway extension project is still alive, but it doesn’t seem to be as hot as it once was,” said Lowndes County Port Director John Hardy. “In the past, we separated the project into two phases. Phase 1 will be land acquisition, environmental studies and things like that, and phase 2 will be construction.
“I think the last cost estimate we got on it was between $5 million and $6 million,” Hardy added. “Obviously, the bulk of the cost will come in phase 2.”
In an attempt to fund phase 1, the port authority will apply for a Mississippi Department of Transportation grant, the board announced during the meeting.
“I hate to throw numbers around before the fact, but I would like to think that grant will cover most or all of that first phase,” said Hardy. “We expect that phase to cost about $200,000, so that’s the amount we will be requesting from MDOT.”
Although the grant likely will not cover the entire rail project, port officials said they had several possible funding sources, like Severstal, Lowndes County and Kinder-Morgan, for the project.
“We don’t know who would be willing to contribute what amount, but we have several options for funding,” Hardy said. “It’s not a project that would just benefit Kinder-Morgan or Severstal, it would benefit that whole side of the river over there.
“We just need to get our name in the hat for that funding,” Hardy added, noting the authority must apply for the grant by April to be considered for funds distributed late this year.
If completed, the rail spur would connect Severstal, Kinder-Morgan and several other business to a Kansas City Southern rail line already in place near the Lowndes County Industrial Park.
In other business, the board announced the port is being considered as a site for a wood products company.
The company, which was not named and is considering several other sites in Mississippi, would occupy a 15-acre tract of land near the city’s east bank port and would employ between 15 and 20 people, said Hardy.
Although the company was scheduled to choose a site March 6, the decision was postponed “several weeks” due to economic concerns, said Hardy.