(The following story by Hurst Laviana appeared on the Wichita Eagle website on October 1.)
WICHITA, Kan. — A two-mile railroad overpass through some of the busiest streets in downtown Wichita could open to train traffic as early as Oct. 16, city officials said last week.
And while the $105 million Central Railroad Corridor project is far from complete, some city officials already are looking at other proposals, one of which would involve building a similar mile-long overpass through the city’s south side.
City council member Jim Skelton, whose district is in south Wichita, said the south-side overpass would carry trains over Harry, Mount Vernon, Pawnee and Hydraulic.
The project could eliminate some of the city’s most hazardous crossings, he said, including the Burlington Northern Santa Fe crossing at Pawnee, which is listed as the city’s most hazardous.
Building a south-side rail corridor makes more sense than building an overpass that eliminates only one or two crossings.
For most Wichita motorists, the crossings that cause the longest delays are on tracks that run north and south through the heart of the city.
The Burlington Northernmoves 38 trains a day through the corridor on its tracks. The Union Pacific crossings in the corridor handle seven to 20 trains a day.
When deciding which crossing projects should receive the highest priority, city engineers rely on a formula that results in a “hazard index” that is assigned to each crossing.
The formula multiplies the daily volume of train traffic by the daily volume of vehicle traffic. That number is then multiplied by the crossing’s “hazard weight”– 0.1 for a crossing with lights and gates, 0.6 for a crossing with lights, and 1.0 for a crossing marked only by crossbucks.
It’s no surprise that the Burlington Northern crossing on Pawnee has the city’s highest index. Pawnee is the only city street on the hazard list that carries more than 20,000 vehicles a day. K-15 also carries 20,000 vehicles daily, but is not considered a city street.
Although accidents are not factored into the index, the Pawnee crossing has been the site of at least five over the past eight years, according Wichita police and Federal Railroad Administration records.
The last occurred about 2:30 p.m. Saturday when an eastbound pickup that was stopped on the tracks at a light was struck by a southbound train. The driver was not injured.
Three of the other accidents also occurred when cars stopped on the tracks were struck by trains. The fourth involved a driver who went around the crossing gates. Only one resulted in injuries.
A list of the city’s 50 most hazardous crossings appears in a railroad crossing plan released this summer by the Wichita Area Metropolitan Planning Organization.
The report contains plans and cost estimates for improving many of the city’s high-hazard crossings.
On 21st Street, the report includes a plan to build a $25 million bridge over the Union Pacific tracks near Washington. But there is no plan for crossing the Burlington Northern tracks near 21st and Broadway — a project that would be trickier and far more expensive.
One plan for improving the Pawnee crossing calls for building an overpass over Pawnee and a nearby crossing on Hydraulic. The Hydraulic crossing ranks 17th on the list of the city’s most hazardous. The Pawnee-Hydraulic project would cost an estimated $18.5 million.
Mickey Thull, a Wichita Department of Public Works engineer who oversees railroad crossings in the city, said it makes sense to build one bridge over both crossings.
A second Pawnee proposal would extend the overpass a mile to the north and carry trains over Harry and Mount Vernon. Harry ranks ninth on the hazardous crossing list, while Mount Vernon ranks 16th. The estimated cost of that project is $45 million to $65 million.
Skelton said he thinks that the city’s next major crossing project should deal with the crossing on Pawnee.
“My position is that the city should pursue the one that’s the most dangerous,” he said.
And if the tracks are raised over Pawnee, he asked, why not extend the bridge over Mount Vernon and Harry?
“We still want to look at a way to get it over Lincoln, but I’m not sure we’ll be able to do that,” he said.
Skelton said most of the cost of the project would be picked up by state and federal governments, which are providing more than 70 percent of the $105 million cost of the Central Railroad Corridor. The city and railroad are paying the rest.
Although trains should begin using the Central Railroad Corridor soon, the project will continue for at least another year, project engineer Mike Jacobs said.
Jacobs said he can’t guarantee that trains will start using the corridor on Oct. 16 because the railroad has deadlines of its own to meet before it can make the switch.
“If we miss that date, then we have two more dates in early November,” he said. “If we miss those, it will be after Christmas.”
Jacobs said Burlington Northern officials don’t want to make the switch between Thanksgiving and Christmas because that is their busiest time of the year.
Even when the trains are using the elevated tracks, Jacobs said, work on improving the roads beneath them isn’t scheduled to start until next year.
That’s when crews will start pulling out the rails and smoothing the humps that were built into the crossings.
The project also will eliminate the low-clearance underpasses at First and Second streets, making it easier to drive trucks into downtown Wichita.
Thull said moving trains onto the corridor would be a significant milestone in the project and would cut motorists’ crosstown delays dramatically.
“I think people who travel east and west in Wichita will notice it very quickly,” he said. “They’re used to having to stop for trains. Now they won’t have to.”