(The following story by Jeff Sturgeon appeared on The Roanoke Times website on May 19, 2010.)
ROANOKE, Val. — The Virginia Supreme Court has taken up Montgomery County’s case against a planned rail yard in Elliston.
In a posting on its Web site this morning, the court announced it will hear the county’s appeal of a previous decision to let the $35 million facility be built.
The county has challenged the state over a plan to divide the cost of the project with Norfolk Southern railroad, saying the use of state money would represent an illegal giveaway of public funds to a private entity.
A Richmond judge rejected the county’s claim, saying that because the intermodal yard would assist with the shifting of freight from trucks to rail, the yard has a public purpose justifying an expenditure of tax dollars.
Norfolk Southern has bought several parcels at the proposed site, a 65-acre swath of an agricultural property in eastern Montgomery County. A heavy-equipment operator demolished several buildings in January on the railroad’s pieces of land, but construction of the project has not begun.