(The Associated Press circulated the following article on November 26.)
HELENA, Mont. — A bid by an orthodontist here to buy the Helena-to-Great Falls rail line from BNSF Railway has been rejected by the federal Surface Transportation Board.
Office of Proceedings Director David Konschnik said Daniel Fiehrer failed to show he had the financing necessary to purchase and operate the route for at least three years.
“Without providing any evidentiary support, Dr. Fiehrer assumes that unnamed local shippers will seek service over the line, that other rail carriers will route rail cars over the line or seek trackage rights to use this line, and that the line will make a profit,” Konschnik wrote.
“(T)here is no indication that the line could be operated profitably,” he added.
Fiehrer said Friday he wasn’t sure if he would reapply.
“I think it’s all for naught,” he said, adding that he’s “a little individual dealing with a three-ton gorilla.”
The decision also rejected Fiehrer’s requests for BNSF to provide a list of shippers who used the line before 2000, when the railroad last ran traffic on the route.
Fiehrer, who termed his application as “preliminary,” said his requests for the names of shippers and the rail line’s costs were necessary for him to draft a final application.
“What we were trying to do is really get some information so we could file a permanent application,” he said.
Fiehrer said he had interest from short-line railroad companies and people willing to operate dinner trains along the line.
Attorneys representing the railway and two Helena men, members of a Great Falls trail advocacy group, each had claimed Fiehrer’s request was incomplete and said his motive was not to run a rail line but prevent the route from becoming a bike and pedestrian trail. Fiehrer owns two parcels of property along the rail line.