(The following story by rindi White appeared on the Anchorage Daily News website on October 3.)
WASILLA, Alaska — The Matanuska-Susitna Borough wants a rail line to connect the Alaska Railroad main line north of Wasilla to Port MacKenzie, and hopes trains are running on it by 2012.
There are several hurdles, however. Before a single railroad tie is laid, the borough and the Alaska Railroad need permission to build from the federal Surface Transportation Board, which oversees railroad rates, mergers and new routes.
To that end, the borough and railroad corporation since June have been working on a route analysis by packaging past route studies with new environmental information. This week, a crew hired for the project is wrapping up soil testing along possible rail corridors, and the borough kicked off a weeklong round of public meetings on the issue.
After the information is gathered, borough and railroad officials hope to pass along to the Surface Transportation Board in December environmental data, land ownership, public comments and other information.
A route has not been selected. The Mat-Su Assembly this year endorsed a route that skirts Nancy Lakes State Recreation Area and connects with the Alaska Railroad north of Willow, one of three proposed routes.
But all options are on the table, said Borough Manager John Duffy.
“There is no preferred alternative,” he said.
Also being studied are links in Houston and Big Lake. Two options on the southern end of the rail line have emerged as well, one running east of the Point MacKenzie Agricultural Area and one running west of it, between the farms and the Susitna Flats State Game Refuge.
With all of the routes, borough spokeswoman Patty Sullivan said, there is room to tweak the line to reduce impacts.
“We’re trying to keep people whole,” Sullivan said.
Crowded around big maps on tables at one end of a Best Western Lake Lucille Inn banquet room Monday, property owners in the triangle from Point MacKenzie to Big Lake and Willow made notes about what the 200-foot right-of-way route for a rail line should avoid.
Recreational property owner Jon McCracken sketched in a ridgeline that runs north and south on the west side of Red Shirt Lake. If the rail line stayed west of the ridgeline, he said, it would reduce the impact on recreational users.
Kit Roberts, a South Knik River resident who has land in the Point MacKenzie area, said he likes the plan to build a rail line to Port MacKenzie. The port needs it to be economically viable, he said.
Roberts, a member of the local snowmachining group Mat-Su Motor Mushers, said he is worried about how the rail line could affect his hobby. Borough and railroad officials at the meeting said they plan to build crossings for trails at the rail line, but only if the trails are legally recognized. Roberts said that means property owners who are used to firing up their machines and riding out of their yard to get to trails might have to go a mile or two out of their way to get to a crossing.
“Personally, I don’t think going a couple miles out of the way is going to be a problem,” Roberts said. “I just want to make sure what they do is done reasonably.”
The borough hopes to build the new rail line by 2012 to serve a coal-to-gas plant that fertilizer manufacturer Agrium hopes to have running then. Depending on the route, the rail line is between 28 and 45 miles long and is estimated to cost $300 million.
Brian Lindamood, special projects manager with the Alaska Railroad, said project leaders hope for a decision from the Surface Transportation Board by mid 2009. If approved, borough and railroad officials will work on a financing package and move ahead on the project.
Borough leaders say the new route would make limestone and other mineral mining north of the borough economically feasible and would transform the borough-owned Port MacKenzie into the natural resource-shipping facility it was designed to be.
“If this project moves forward, it would be the first major transportation project in the state since the Parks Highway,” Duffy said. “Just think for a moment about that, the economic activity related to the Parks Highway. That’s what this project would do.”
Railroad spokesman Tim Thompson said a route to Port MacKenzie would free up space on the busy rail line between Anchorage and Fairbanks.
“This area does get congested. We have a lot of trains competing for space right now,” Thompson said.