(The following story by Roger Harris appeared on the Knoxville News Sentinel website on June 21.)
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Norfolk Southern’s plan for an East Tennessee intermodal railroad terminal would be a major economic boost for the region – creating jobs, stimulating growth of existing businesses and attracting new companies, area economic development officials say.
“It would be a great thing for this region,” said Doug Lawyer, director of economic development for the Knoxville Chamber. “Absolutely, it would make us more competitive in recruitment.”
Lawyer spoke with a Norfolk Southern official earlier this week about the project.
“They are still early in the process. They’re looking for a pretty big chunk of land – 200 to 300 acres,” Lawyer said.
Thom Robinson, president and CEO of the Morristown Area Chamber of Commerce, said he plans to contact Norfolk Southern soon to pitch the virtues of building the terminal in or near his city.
“Certainly, if we can locate a site that meets their requirements, we would be most interested in having that terminal here,” Robinson said.
Upper East Tennessee should be part of the conversation, too, said Gary Mabrey, president and CEO of the Chamber of Commerce of Johnson City, Jonesborough and Washington County.
“With the interstate connections and distribution points we have, it’s something we would like to know more about,” Mabrey said.
An intermodal terminal is a site where cargo containers are transferred between trains and trucks.
Businesses located within driving distance of an intermodal terminal would have access to new markets and be able to ship freight more efficiently, the economic development officials said.
Norfolk Southern plans to build two new intermodal facilities – the other would be in Maryland – as part of a $2 billion upgrade of its freight network running from Louisiana to New Jersey. The project is called the “Crescent Corridor.”
The railroad plans to start work on the corridor in 2008 and finish by 2013. The corridor includes about 1,400 miles of rail crossing parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
“We anticipate intermodal traffic will continue to build and we need to make sure our infrastructure has the capacity to handle the growth,” said Robin Chapman, manager of public relations for the Norfolk, Va.-based company.
Chapman said it’s too soon to know where a new East Tennessee terminal would be built or what it might cost.
Chapman declined to publicly discuss specific criteria for choosing a site, but he said the terminal would be located on “an existing rail line where you can get in one end and out the other without turning trains around. And, it would have to be relatively near a major truck route.”
All of East Tennessee is within easy reach of a main Norfolk Southern rail line running from Chattanooga to Bristol and close to major truck routes, primarily Interstates 40, 75 and 81.
Knoxville sits at the crossroad of I-40 and I-75 and about 20 miles west of the junction of I-40 and I-81.
Norfolk Southern currently operates the John Sevier Yard, a large multitrack facility in East Knox County, but Lawyer said he’s not sure it would be suitable for an intermodal terminal.
“It appears pretty well tapped out,” Lawyer said.
In the late 1990s, Norfolk Southern considered building an intermodal terminal at the Coster Shop property just north of downtown Knoxville.
However, the railroad scrapped those plans and sold much of what was a railroad repair yard to the city of Knoxville. The city subsequently sold about 40 acres to Sysco Corp., the largest food service marketer and distributor in North America.
Norfolk Southern still owns about 32 acres of the old Coster Shop site.
In addition to finding land for new terminals in Tennessee and Maryland, Norfolk Southern must finance the entire corridor improvement project.
The railroad will put up part of the money – exactly how much company officials haven’t said – and it wants a public investment, too.
“The public interest in this is substantial,” Chapman said.
Upgrading its freight lines from Louisiana to New Jersey would reduce highway congestion, reduce the cost of maintaining highways and reduce greenhouse emissions, Chapman said.
“We anticipate the entire project taking at least a million trucks off the highways annually throughout the system,” Chapman said.
Virginia has promised $40 million for the Crescent Corridor project, according to an Associated Press report.
Tennessee Department of Transportation and Norfolk Southern officials have discussed the corridor project, but no state funds have been committed, said TDOT spokesman Travis Brickey.
The focus of the discussions to date have been on improving grade crossings to handle increased train traffic generated by the corridor project, Brickey said.