(The following story by Kelli R. Dick appeared on The Benton Evening News website on November 12.)
BENTON, Ill. — Union Pacific Railroad began a project in Southern Illinois in late October spanning a 74-mile stretch that runs right through Benton.
According to Mark Davis, regional director of public relations for Union Pacific, 100 employees from the largest railroad in North America are replacing nearly 88,000 ties beginning in Salem.
“I would call this a ‘major-normal working project,'” Davis said. “Every year we select a large maintenance project that is most important — and this one is it.”
Davis said workers will also spread 48,000 tons of rock before the massive project is complete, which is supposed to end mid-December.
Davis said Union Pacific will spend $11 million on this project alone. He said the railroad is spending $8.7 million on new railroad ties and $1.8 million to fix railroad crossings.
“We have workers that conduct daily inspections of the railroad ties and crossings,” he said. “They do spot repairs on those that need immediate attention, but when many need replacing it turns into a major project.”
Davis said Union Pacific spends over $1 billion annually on maintenance projects nationwide. He said all the money comes directly from Union Pacific and that not a dime is taxpayer’s money.
There are 57 crossings workers are scheduled to repair while working on this major project. Davis said there are “quite a few” crossings in Benton that will be fixed either because railroad workers determined the need to do so, or he said, Benton city employees have expressed their concern to Union Pacific regarding the repair of certain crossings in town.
“We get a lot of calls from towns wanting crossings repaired, and we try very hard to answer each and every request for help,” Davis said.
Davis also said Union Pacific will be raising train speeds through several of the communities workers are updating.
“We’ve done necessary highway/railroad grade crossing signal modifications and found not only do the trains operate more efficiently, but motorists are not stopped at crossings as long,” Davis said.
Union Pacific covers 23 states across the western two-thirds of the United States. It is the leading carrier of low-sulfur coal used in electrical power generation and is the only railroad to serve all six gateways to Mexico.