(The following story by Jim Sabin appeared on the Newark Advocate website on October 10.)
NEWARK, Ohio — A long, low chain-link fence winds eastward out of Newark, following a mostly straight path through lonely country to Hanover.
Five feet to the north is a bike path, 10 miles of asphalt for bikers or joggers to get their exercise.
Five feet to the south, freight rail cars whiz by, carrying coal and other freight at 25 to 40 miles per hour.
In 1992, the trains took about 2,000 carloads a year down that line. Today, the number has swelled to more than 25,000, with more on the way. The line’s operator, the Ohio Central Railroad, wants to increase that load even further and upgrade the line and use it to draw more industry to the area.
The line’s owner, the state, has even grander plans; it wants to put high-speed passenger trains on the line, carrying people 110 miles an hour from Columbus to Pittsburgh, stopping in Newark.
For his part, Ohio Central President Bill Strawn said the railroad has no plans for the bike trail; indeed, he believes the company couldn’t touch it if it wanted to. And the Ohio Rail Development Commission doesn’t see an issue with the trail, either, unless it looks at passenger rail; that kind of speed 10 feet from a pedestrian might not be safe, it says.
If the Federal Highway Administration had its way, the trail and the track would be 28 feet apart. That ruling, though, came after the trail was built, and it’s more of a guideline than a rule, anyway.
That leaves the stretch of pavement on the north side of the fence looking lonely indeed.
For now, the lease that gives the Ohio Central control over the rail line doesn’t affect the bike trail one bit – Licking County has control over that in a separate lease. But there’s a clause in it that leaves some cause for concern.
“What the lease says, in a nutshell, is that if at any given time in the future that the line that the bike trail is on is needed for rail purposes, that the bike trail would cease to exist,” said Russ Edgington, director and secretary of the Licking Park District.
The rail line known as the Panhandle stretches some 160 miles, connecting Columbus to Mingo Junction, just south of Steubenville on the Ohio border. It passes through Newark, Frazeysburg and Coshocton along the way, and includes a spur south to Hebron.
Ohio Central has controlled it through a series of five-year leases since the state bought the line in 1992. It also controls spurs to Mount Vernon and Zanesville, but they’re not technically part of the Panhandle.
When the Ohio Central took the line, Strawn said, the easternmost 40 miles weren’t even usable. The line carried about 2,000 carloads of freight a day, none of it coal. Today, that number has increased tenfold, and Strawn believes more is on the way. That would be more certain, he said, if the company could obtain a lease term longer than five years.
“A long-term lease allows the railroad to go out and try to attract new industry, which would not be too comfortable talking to a rail company that potentially would not be there in five years,” he said.
The state’s listening. The Ohio Rail Development Commission formed a committee to explore possible terms of a longer-term lease, and the committee had its first meeting Friday. While the state is tentatively thinking about 20 years, at least one person who attended the meeting, Heath-Newark-Licking County Port Authority Director Rick Platt, said the railroad is asking for 70 years.
“We just want to make sure that in dealing with those (details), there aren’t consequences, maybe unintended by the railroad and the state, that will have an impact on the public,” Platt said.
He and 18 others from Licking County, including the Chamber of Commerce, all three county commissioners, state Rep. Jay Hottinger, and area businessman J. Gilbert Reese, signed a letter to the commission asking that the state maintain oversight over the line and ensure it’s run properly if a longer-term lease is approved.
For his part, Reese, who oversees the T.J. Evans Foundation that built the bike path, doesn’t think a longer term is wise. He’s also convinced the Ohio Central wants the bike path gone.
“If I owned that, like the state of Ohio does, I would be leasing it for a five-year lease,” Reese said.
He worries that, given full control, the Ohio Central would demand higher rates from users who don’t have another rail option. He also doesn’t believe the rail line is maintained properly.
“There are lots of places where you could pull spikes right out. They don’t put up much resistance,” he said. “I’m not an expert on how you handle rails, but I just can’t imagine that you’d want to have it so you could pull the spikes out.”
Strawn argues that the company has made tremendous improvements to the line, and while he doesn’t plan to remove the bike path, he admitted it does get in the way of maintenance crews.
“It’s extremely close. The track machinery is unable to reach underneath the track, extract the ties and put new ties in,” he said. “It is a challenge for us. We’ve been able to struggle through it.”
Even so, though, he said the company could make more and better improvements with a longer lease. If nothing else, lenders won’t give larger loans for lines that have such a short term on the lease, he said.
“As a standalone railroad, the Panhandle line cannot bank itself, so we have subsidized the line from other railroads,” Strawn said.
Stu Nicholson, spokesman for the Rail Development Commission, agreed a longer lease would help get better loans and added the line does still need work.
“There’s some fairly big-ticket items along that line in terms of infrastructure that need to be made,” he said.
As an example, he referred a tunnel near Mingo Junction that needs to be rehabilitated.
At this point, there’s no tremendous urgency; the Ohio Central signed a new lease in June, though another, longer one could be signed at any time. So far, the state hasn’t drafted a lease yet, Nicholson said.
That’s why Licking County is raising its concerns now, Platt said. The coalition made six requests, with particular emphasis on making sure the Ohio Central allows open access to other rail companies, works with the county on grade crossings and makes upgrades to the line.
It also wants the state to be able to step in at any time if the Ohio Central provides poor service.
“The devil’s in the details of the lease, which has not yet been drafted. It’s pleasing to think we’ll have a chance to see those details before the final action is taken,” said Platt, who added he isn’t necessarily against the right long-term lease.
Strawn said fears that rates will increase are unfounded and that the company already allows open access, including trains owned by Norfolk Southern and the Wheeling & Erie Railroad.
“The only people that control the rates now are us,” he said. “The rate factor is federally controlled. The market drives the rates. Seven years ago, not one carload of coal moved from an Ohio mine to anywhere on an Ohio Central or Panhandle line.”
Reese said he hopes that continues, although he fears that a long-term lease would amount to a monopoly that would give the railroad right to do whatever it wants with the rates.
The Rail Development Commission’s next committee meeting will be Oct. 19 in Columbus. Platt said he hopes the commission will remember that the term of the lease isn’t the only consideration for rail development; the Coshocton ethanol plant now under construction points to that.
“If there were uncertainty about the Panhandle (today), they really wouldn’t have had a reason to invest in Coshocton County or Licking County,” he said. “They really have had 20 years playing under the game.”
And as for that lonely fence and the bike path? Only time will tell.