The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (PANYNJ) Board of Commissioners approved a major redevelopment of Greenville Yard that will include a new ExpressRail facility, the fourth of its type to be built by the agency, that will support the adjacent Global Marine Terminal. This will allow the terminal to ship and receive containerized cargo by rail.
Union Pacific will strengthen Nebraska’s transportation infrastructure by investing $11 million in the rail line between Grand Island and Gibbon, Neb. The UP-funded project began September 12 and is scheduled to be completed by mid-December.
Beginning September 20, 2014 and continuing each weekend through November 23, 2014, Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) and third-party contractors will replace bridge timbers and make structural improvements to the Cobbs Creek and Darby Creek Viaducts along its Media/Elwyn regional line in Delaware.
Watco Companies has formed the Watco Safety, Training, and Compliance Team. The company says the team formation is an effort to continually improve focus on its people and customers.
Two pieces of rail-related legislation have progressed on opposite sides of the hill.
The Association of American Railroads (AAR) is expressing concerns over the Surface Transportation Board (STB) Reauthorization Bill (S.2777), scheduled to be marked up in the Senate Commerce Committee on Wednesday, September 17, 2014.
The Washington State Department of Transportation and the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) recently completed the environmental study of the Kelso Martin’s Bluff Rail Project in Washington state, which would provide more frequent and reliable service for Amtrak Cascades passengers between Seattle and Portland.
Kansas City Southern completed a large bridge project where it rebuilt six timber bridges on the Beaumont Subdivision in an area known as the Sabine River bottoms near Starks, La., in order to increase track speed to add capacity.
Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) New York City Transit (NYCT) marked the restoration of normal R subway service September 15 between Brooklyn and Manhattan with the successful completion of the Montague Tube subway tunnel that was damaged during Superstorm Standy.
Starting September 15, crews will begin work at the Harlem River Lift Bridge in New York to replace 60-year-old cables that lift the bridge and install all new electrical components designed to increase their resiliency to potential storm surge flooding.
Nordco Inc. hired Jeff Roschyk as president of rail, where he will oversee the entire rail business, including new equipment, rebuild and aftermarket, rail inspection services and rail sales.
The U.S. Department of Transportation awarded $53.7 million in Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) grants that will help rail projects in six states and District of Columbia.
The U.S. Department of Transportation has awarded $2.5 million in Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery funds to complete the master plan for expansion of the marine terminal in Seward, Alaska.
The Alaska Railroad Corporation (ARRC) and the city of Seward submitted the application for the planning grant funds concurrently with an application for capital project grant funding. These grants are necessary to fund improvements to Seward’s West Dock, which primarily services passenger ships and is nearing the end of its useful life.
While the program makes competitive grants based on a variety of factors, U.S. Sen. Mark Begich (D-AL) said a recent visit by U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx certainly helped.
“I brought Secretary Foxx to Alaska in August so that he could get a better understanding of our state’s special transportation challenges. I’m glad to see the visit generated some real results,” said Sen. Begich. “These grant funds will be used to develop plans for the Seward dock expansion, a project that will provide family-wage jobs and increase transportation and economic growth in Seward and throughout the state.”
Sen. Begich organized a meeting between representatives of ARRC, Secretary Foxx and other transportation leaders during his visit to Alaska. During the meeting, railroad representatives pressed Secretary Foxx on the urgency of funding the Seward Marine Terminal Expansion project. In order to complete the project, ARRC must complete several studies including a passenger study, freight traffic study and transportation connectivity study. These elements will be the foundation of a new Seward Marine Terminal Expansion Master Plan, which will allow ARRC to prioritize infrastructure improvements at the terminal in order to better serve regional, state and national partners and customers.
Alon USA Energy, Inc., has received approval from the Kern County Board of Supervisors to construct a new rail facility at the Bakersfield, California, refinery and to make modifications to the refinery that will allow it to process light crude.
The New Jersey Transit Board of Directors has appointed Neil Yellin as the agency’s new deputy executive director and Robert Lavell as vice president and general manager of NJ Transit Rail Operations.
Several rail-related projects across eight states will benefit from close to $90 million million in Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery (TIGER) grants.
The M-1 Rail streetcar project in Detroit, Mich., has set up an assembly line near Cass Avenue to weld steel rail into about forty 560-foot-long strings of continuously welded rail (CWR).
U.S. Sens. John Thune (R-SD) and John Rockefeller IV (D-WV) introduced the STB Reauthorization Act of 2014, which the senators said is expected to increase efficiency of the Surface Transportation Board (STB) by changing internal processes and increasing timeliness of STB decisions to improve U.S. rail service.
Canadian National (CN) has officially opened its new employee training center in Winnipeg, Manitoba. The 100,000-square-foot facility is currently hosting 350-plus CN students from across Canada every week, with hands-on training for all key railway jobs.
Harsco Rail signed an agreement providing the company with exclusive worldwide sales and marketing of MRail’s vertical track deflection measurement technology.