(The following appeared on the Journal of Commerce website on April 29, 2011.)
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Norfolk Southern Railroad is starting to build its Memphis Regional Intermodal Facility, planned as a western anchor of its latest cross-country double-stack route, as railroad and state officials held a groundbreaking ceremony in Rossville, Tenn.
NS pegs the cost of the facility at $105 million, although some reports put it higher. That hub and another planned at Birmingham, Ala., split a $105 million federal grant from the 2009 economic stimulus package, the largest award made under the DOT’s “TIGER” grant program.
Those two sites will be key hubs in the railroad’s Crescent Corridor, which will extend from the Mississippi River Delta up into the consumer-rich Northeast.
NS is applying $52.5 million of the federal funds to the Memphis project, which means half its expected cost is covered by the stimulus grant. NS has reportedly committed $31 million of its own funds to the project and is working with state partners along the corridor route to pin down the rest.
Full story: www.joc.com