» News Wire » Mississippi Export Railroad reroute approved Trains Magazine Newswire Mississippi Export Railroad reroute approved Published: August 25, 2014 PASCAGOULA, Miss. – Port of Pascagoula commissioners have approved an agreement with the U.S. Department of Transportation for a $14 million TIGER grant to relocate the Mississippi Export Railroad’s interchange with CSX out of downtown Pascagoula. Commissioners have also approved a professional services agreement with Compton Engineering for work associated with the grant project, the Mobile Press-Register reports. The funds are part of the TIGER discretionary grant program, and they will be combined with $4 million in local funds to complete the $18 million project. The project includes rail improvements within the Bayou Casotte terminal facility, a rail unloading pit to facilitate bulk deliveries, shed demolition and bulkhead repairs at Terminal E/F and rail improvements along U.S. 90, Mill Avenue and Orange Grove Road. Rail improvements along U.S. 90 will consist of about 11,200 track feet, and the Mill Avenue/Orange Grove Road work will consist of about 13,300 track feet. The project will reroute the Mississippi Export Railroad after it crosses a bridge around old International Paper Co. property. It will be rerouted down the Kreole Lead, and it will move the interchange with CSX from downtown Pascagoula to east of Mississippi Highway 63. The grant will pay for the full cost of the project and will remove 16 rail crossings through Moss Point and Pascagoula. Design work should be complete by November, the agreement said, and construction should begin in January. Substantial completion should come in May 2016.
Ken, the MSE office and shop facility is located at 4519 Mcinnis Ave, Moss Point, MS (30°24'36.88" N 88°31'33.47" W). If I understand correctly, the new line will start less than a mile east of this facility. Using Google Earth, follow the line east from the MSE facility across the bayou to a small yard and wye. I think the new line will extend from east wye lead which used to serve the old International Paper plant, now just an empty grey foundation. The line to the current CSX interchange in Pascagoula goes south from the MSE facility through crowded areas of Moss Point and Pascagoula, including 17 grade crossings. For many years, MS Power received 100-car unit coal trains three times a week via this interchange to serve the generating plant about five miles north of the MSE facility. You can imagine how much these 100-car trains at 10 mph upset local folks, especially the more than half of about 10,000 Ingalls Shipyard employees. Both MSE and CSX tried to schedule these trains in the wee hours after midnight, but occasionally that didn't work out.
I can imagine. I used to get blocked at a crossing just outside an employer parking lot. Late for work a few times. Ended up having to go earlier every morning, just to avoid BN, which was switching our plant. At that time of the morning, there'd be a big backup onto the freeway, and it took hours afterward to thin out again! There was a back entrance to the parking lot, but our $%^&*%#% management would only open it to let day shift out. Which made no sense to anyone else.
Thanks for moving this thread. I couldn't find a financial statement to verify if the MSE had enough annual revenue to qualify as a Class-III, which is why I posted the thread in the generic Ready Track forum.
It can depend upon the company structure, whether financially publicly held or private. They may not need to disclose much, if anything at all, which we could easily research.
Years ago I had a contact well placed within the ICC. He gave me the formula they used for computing which railroads fit which category. I need to try finding that letter again. Anyhow, it is NOT those numbers commonly batted around by railfans. Those numbers are base line figures only. There is an adjustment percentage added to that number, annually, via their formula. Interesting here is it can be anywhere from late August into October of the succeeding year, before they've finally crunched numbers for all companies, and those become available for release. So those for 2013 may now be available, or still in the works.
