(The following story by Mary E. Arata appeared on the Nashoba Publishing website on August 13, 2009.)
AYER, Mass. — Despite the attempts of Niki Tsongas’ Ayer town meeting on July 29, there are no plans for a sit-down between members Pan Am and CSX railways to discuss a lease that has become the center of an environmental-safety dispute.
“I’m not aware of any meeting at this time,” said Cynthia Scarano, a Pan Am spokesman and vice president from her North Billerica office.
Citizens attending the public meeting urged Tsongas to get involved to bring together railway representatives and staffers from the office of Congressman John Olver of Amherst. Olver is the chair of the House Subcommittee on Transportation.
Topping the agenda would be any possible approaches to negotiate around CSX’s 1996 long-term lease of a Pan Am-owned auto transfer rail yard off Willow Road in Ayer. CSX has the 2,000 parking-space lot tied up through the year 2016, but currently does not use the facility.
Meanwhile, earth-clearing work is nearly complete and preparation for paving in mid-September is on schedule for a 26-acre portion of the larger 125-acre San Vel property across Willow Road. Ayer residents are concerned about the effects paving and subsequently locating an auto transfer facility will have on the town’s protected aquifer districts. The property currently overlaps the Ayer zone 2 and Littleton zone 3 aquifers.
“We talk to CSX on a daily basis just on regular business,” said Scarano, referring to routine shipping issues. When one of the major train carriers, such as CSX or Norfolk Southern railways, are moving a freight load across country, they switch locomotives and Pan Am powers the load to its final New England destination.
Other than those kind of basic discussions, Scarano says Pan Am hasn’t been notified of any effort by Tsongas’ office to bring competitors Pan Am and CSX to the table to talk about other ways to handle the now-vacant Willow Road auto- transfer facility.
While CSX sits on the Ayer Willow Road site, it conducts most of its auto transfer business out of its East Brookfield facility. CSX has closed a similar auto transfer lot in Framingham, and an effort to develop another auto rail yard in Westborough derailed in recent years.
Speaking from his Philadelphia office, CSX Regional spokesman Robert Sullivan said the company would be “willing to talk” about the issue if the Congresswoman’s office wished to bring the parties to the table.
“Members of Congress and their staff often contact us on issues in their districts and we are always more than happy to assist them with them,” said Sullivan.
“We have had discussions in the past about the use of that facility. Obviously there was no agreement reached as a result but we’re certainly willing to have discussions again with respect to the use of the Ayer facility,” Sullivan said.
Pan Am tried to break the lease in federal court in 2006 and lost. Scarano said he could not comment on any possible talks since then between CSX and Pan Am to try to restructure an agreement on the lot’s use.
Congressman Olver’s office did not return requests for comments.
John Noble of Tsongas’ Washington office said there was a meeting last week between Olver’s office and Pan Am representatives.
Noble added that Tsongas’ office is in the process of setting up the meeting with Tsongas, Olver and CSX.