The Surface Transportation Board (STB) ruled today that the city can’t tear up the Kellar Branch for at least another 90 days so Carver Lumber has time to evaluate the service they receive from Central Illinois Railway (CIRY) over the spur connecting to the Union Pacific (UP) line to the west. This is exactly what Carver Lumber requested — time to evaluate whether this service would be adequate before the Kellar Branch is irreversibly turned into a hiking/biking trail. I’m sure it was sweet vindication for Carver to read the STB’s statement: “Carver Lumber’s request for time to evaluate the service options that the shipper may now have is reasonable in the circumstances presented here.”
During the 90 days between now and July 24, CIRY has to prove its service over the western spur will be adequate and comparable to service Carver used to receive from Pioneer Industrial Rail (PIRY) over the Kellar Branch, and both CIRY and Carver have to report their findings to the STB so it can make a final ruling. Also, PIRY will have an extra 20 days (until August 14) to respond to CIRY and Carver’s filings.
Expect an editorial sometime in the next week to decry the loss of grant money for the Kellar Branch rail-to-trail conversion. Boo hoo hoo.
Take the name Carver out of the equation and it’s goodbye rail line; when are you people going to wake up-don’t you remember where the man works?
I think that Craver needs to do some comparision delivery’s. Maybe let the cars come via the Kellar Branch connection, see what the price difference is, also whether CIRY can even get the car(s) up the hill.
1. I am willing to bet the fees via Kellar will be less.
2. CIRY will bungle the Kellar move, there-by allowing the bane of Peoria, Pioneer Rail, get the line back.
I see this all as sweet justice against Peoria Park District for a complete mis-handling of this trail issue in the first place.
Unfortunately, those grants just never seem to go away. They keep getting extended and renewed. Wish the State was as determined to spend a little of its money in a constructive way, rather than wasting it on another tax-gobbling boondoggle like this trail. Tearing up a good rail line and building that trail is but a drop in the bucket. The Knoxville Avenue bridge will cost $10 million going away. Probably more. And then there will be the Pioneer Parkway Bridge and the upkeep on all this. Who is going to pay for it? The Park District is still subsidizing the RiverPlex boondoogle.
Yes, that is the one of those things you don’t hear anyone talking about in this controversy — how these hikers/bikers are going to cross Pioneer Parkway, Giles, Northmoor, Knoxville, Prospect, etc., safely. The cost of building a pedestrian bridge over just one of these roadways is astronomical. Didn’t there used to be a pedestrian bridge over War Memorial by Washington Gifted School? Whatever happened to it?
That bridge got torn down, I think it was falling apart. Also if I remember right, they had problems with vandalism with passing traffic. I would imagine the liability insurance will be pretty great for those bridges.
Odd how we don’t hear any speak of this. Come on Chris, pull some weight around and call Bonnie up, since you are on a first name basis, and ask here that question, or better yet, how about Sandburg, what does he say will be the location of the funds for this? Surely Ray “The Hoodlum” LaHood could get that money for us, just be another Alaskan Bridge to nowhere…
I have reason to believe the cost of getting the trail across Knoxville will approach one million. I have seen the construction drawings.
Riman II wrote:
“Take the name Carver out of the equation and it’s goodbye rail line; when are you people going to wake up-don’t you remember where the man works?”
Considering that Dick Carver sold his company several years ago, I don’t see how what you said here is relevant. Personally, I think if the Kellar Branch had no customers it should still be preserved so rail service would be available to potential future tenants of Pioneer Industrial Park.