Looks like Birmingham is taking the railroads a lot more seriously than we are and they don't even have a port! Do conversations like this even take place in Jacksonville?? More lack of vision and leadership?!QuoteBirmingham has a rail-side seat as railroad transport regains steam
By Michael Tomberlin -- The Birmingham News
December 06, 2009, 11:29AM
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Birmingham's L&N Depot in 1933. Railroad ties bind Birmingham's Magic City boomtown past with a future of global trade and 21st century commerce. (The Birmingham News files)
You can almost hear the trains a-coming as if in a Johnny Cash song.
From Warren Buffett to Birmingham's head inÂdustry hunters, honchos have hitched their hopes to the re-emergence of trains, banking that the railroad has enough horsepower to pull them into prosperity.
Experts say Birmingham has a track-side seat to what's being dubbed the "rail renaissance." They say just as BirÂmingham was born at the junction of key railroad lines, the Magic City itself will be key as trains become more relÂevant in the new economy.
Tracks of that assertion are everywhere.
On Monday, Norfolk, Va.-based Norfolk Southern Corp. closed on the purchase of the last of the six parcels of land in McCalla, giving the railroad company 316 acres where it plans to build a $112 million railroad hub to handle interÂmodal trains.
Norfolk Southern's Birmingham Regional Intermodal Facility is projected to create or preserve 8,600 jobs and have an economic impact of more than $4 billion over the next decade.
The hub could be up and running by 2012 and indusÂtrial recruiters said companies have already started knocking on their door looking to build new warehouses, distribution centers and light manufacturing plants as a reÂsult.
There are other signals:
> CSX began operating a much more modest intermodal hub in Bessemer in SepÂtember and held a ceremony to formally open the facility on Wednesday.
> Companies have been expressing inÂterest in industrial sites near Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp.'s Birmingham railÂways, raising speculation that company could be boosting its operations here.
> The Birmingham Business Alliance is compiling a new inventory of all of the comÂmercial properties and vacant land that eiÂther have rail access or could have rail lines added to them, in anticipation of future acÂtivity.
In an interview with The Birmingham News, Wick Moorman, CEO of Norfolk Southern Corp., said a number of factors have been coupled together to make trains hot again.
"You've kind of got this confluence of events beginning in about 2002-2003, which both gave the railroad carriers more busiÂness and gave us something we have not had for 25 years which was a little more pricing power in the marketplace," MoorÂman said.
Those events included higher fuel prices, heavier congestion on the nation's highÂways and companies increasingly conÂcerned about being "green."
'All-in wager'
Last month Buffett, CEO of Berkshire HaÂthaway Inc., announced a $44 billion deal to buy the 77.4 percent of Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. it didn't already own.
"Our country's future prosperity depends on its having an efficient and well-mainÂtained rail system," Buffett said in a release announcing the deal. "Conversely, America must grow and prosper for railroads to do well. Most important of all, however, it's an all-in wager on the economic future of the United States. I love these bets."
Moorman doesn't think it's much of a gamble.
"The industry has a really bright future, and I think Mr. Buffett's purchase of BNSF illustrates that," Moorman said. "He looks at the world through long-term lenses."
Moorman said Birmingham, too, is poised for long-term success with the railÂroad.
"We think that Birmingham and the greater Birmingham area are critically imÂportant to our future success," Moorman said, pointing out that it is critical in the company's $2.5 billion Crescent Corridor initiative to link New Jersey to Louisiana through intermodal hubs.
"The fact that it (Birmingham) is a major nexus of transportation routes and Norfolk Southern routes, that really sets the stage for more industrial development, more job growth and it should really, I think, help the prosperity of the region to a considerable extent," he said.
Jacksonville, Fla.-based CSX is another railroad company with substantial and growing operations in Birmingham.
Past meets future
Tuesday's official opening of the 25-acre Central Alabama Intermodal Container Transfer Facility in Bessemer epitomizes the region's link between the past and the future when it comes to the rail industry. The facility is in the Interstate Industrial Park and next to the former home of the Pullman-Standard Car Manufacturing Co., which produced more than 1 million rail cars from 1929 until it closed in 1981.
The Bessemer hub was built to initially supply the Mercedes-Benz plant in Vance -- the company roundly seen as heralding its own industrial renaissance in the state.
Patrick Murphy, head of economic develÂopment with the Birmingham Business AlliÂance, said the $112 million Norfolk SouthÂern hub is one of the largest capital investment projects the metro area is curÂrently pursuing. He said while you can't really compare to the hub to an auto plant in most respects, the potential it has for growth is similar.
"Certainly, to have a project you know will generate other projects for you on its own merits on this scale is rare," he said. "We see tremendous opportunity coming out of it."
Fuel efficiency
The green initiative is helping grow the industry because the environmentally conÂscious are attracted to the railroad's boast it can move 280 truckloads for 436 miles on a gallon of fuel.
By moving from long-haul trucking to inÂtermodal rail, Norfolk Southern said it can divert 579,000 trucks off Alabama's roads each year, save the state 16.6 million gallons of fuel annually and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 185,000 tons a year. The railÂroad estimates $20.5 million a year will be saved just through the reduced congestion and accidents avoided on Alabama roads.
"The very interesting thing that you're seeing happen with a lot of big rail shippers, particularly those who ship by intermodal -- for example Walmart, Target, Home DeÂpot -- are really pushing hard as a corÂporate strategy to improve their sustainabilÂity footprint," Moorman said.
Not everyone is on board with the rail reÂnaissance, however. Several residents in McCalla and parents of children in neighÂboring McAdory Elementary School fear the hub will be too noisy, dirty and ugly for the area, damaging the quality of life and propÂerty values and making local roads unsafe with increased traffic.
Norfolk Southern has said the concerns are unwarranted and CSX's Gooden came to his competitors' defense last week.
"This stuff about 'not in my backyard,' well, somewhere somebody has got to have a place to work and make a living," Gooden said.
Gooden, Moorman and even Warren BufÂfett agree on something else: The tracks to Birmingham's economic future could be the very same ones that originated in the past.
http://blog.al.com/businessnews/2009/12/birmingham_has_a_rail-side_sea.html
I am just sooooo happy for them.
Me too, not like the auto industry has anything at all to do with Birmingham LOL its all rail!!!
I am not sure about the "Auto" Industry part but do know about the "Steel"aspect! Vulcan used to sit on that hill and it was a tourist attraction!
Our leaders don't have the smarts to talk like that; as it says in the play 1776..."THEY PIDDLE, TWIDDLE, AND RESOLVE, NOT ONE DAMN THING DO THEY SOLVE!" That best describes Jax. I am happy for Birmingham too for biting the hook from rail corps and companies and realizing that rail is possibly the future and one of the roads back to prosperity!
Heights Unknown
Good for them, they have to compete with Atlanta which has monster rail yards, CSX has 3 monster yards there and intermodal. NS has Simpson on the south end of town, so B-Ham had no choice but to sellout to rail.
We need to stay close to our virtues of the port.
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Uh, MTrain, Simpson yard is in Jacksonville, and it does have intermodal capacity. NS operates the Earnest Norris Yard in Birmingham. Counting our smaller yards Jacksonville has 8 yards.
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Guess where?
Keep in mind that rail yards are dinosaurs, places that perfectly good revenue producing rail cars go to DIE! While they are a necessary evil, railroads keep inventing ways to go around them. About the only places where they serve any purpose besides car supply or maintenance, are at critical junctions and interchange points (Where cars from XYZ railroad are handed off to ABC railroad). Some yards serve certain industries, such as our own BUSH YARD, while others serve to make up and break up trains, like BOWDEN.
Once upon a time trains traveled from yard to yard to yard, as cars crisscrossed the country. Today, the train is more likely to run from Terminal to Terminal, neither of which is a traditional yard space.
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Imagine a bulk terminal on the St. Johns... Rebuild the "S", access to all carriers and just add continers and trailers.
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How about a compact version Jaxport? This is Santa Marta COLOMBIA! Note the rail facilities and the small container facility. Our Terminal should fit the local demand for any type of cargo service.
An intermodal Terminal really doesn't serve as a yard per se, nor does it have to be a place exclusively for containers or trailers. Today, all purpose bulk terminals are a growing aspect of the industry, they contain every conceivable loading or storage space including containers and trailers. Jacksonville needs to get with the program or give up on the port.
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Once again, Opportunity knocks Jacksonville.
OCKLAWAHA
I agree Ock........oppertunity is knocking but the powers that are in place ain't listening! No vision and darn sure no plan!
yes...folks here are talking about building another intermodal facility (container transfer) near Jaxort....and keep in mind that we alredy have two large intermodal railyards in Jax.
Quote from: mtraininjax on December 07, 2009, 09:06:33 AM
Good for them, they have to compete with Atlanta which has monster rail yards, CSX has 3 monster yards there and intermodal. NS has Simpson on the south end of town, so B-Ham had no choice but to sellout to rail.
We need to stay close to our virtues of the port.
Yeah, but doesn't rail most often dictate what the port does and vice versa? So we still should pursue rail whether commercial, commuter or otherwise. It will benefit us I think in the long run.
"HU"
I have no problem with a satellite intermodal facility unless "Rail" for moving those containers out is not taken care of before rather than after! The 9B Extension is designed solely for that container traffic (and the developers) So Port them to here via ship, but get them outta town by rail.............which means whether its CSX or FEC rail capacity would have to increase which means more track!
QuoteAn intermodal Terminal really doesn't serve as a yard per se, nor does it have to be a place exclusively for containers or trailers. Today, all purpose bulk terminals are a growing aspect of the industry, they contain every conceivable loading or storage space including containers and trailers. Jacksonville needs to get with the program or give up on the port.
Ock - Sorry bud, that argument of Jax to give up on the Port is just plain ludicrous. We have a natural resource at our disposal, one that has been here longer than the railroads, one that only a handfull of cities have in the US, and you want us to, excuse me..........give up on it? The Ports employ, according to JPA over 60,000 people direct and indirectly in Jax. Ferrin wants to take it to 100,000, which I think is low, but very achievable, given the new container sites that have been developed over the last few years. Some of those jobs are rail jobs as well. So take it easy on the port, it will grow the choo-choo action too, but its an economic engine that rail, in our area, cannot compete with.
You can spend billions to buy land for more rail operations, you can only remove so much silt and dirt in the river. Perhaps we should tax the ships for using the river to keep the taxes fair between both rail and water.
I think Ock's point was giving up on the port is ludicrous. When someone says do it right or give it up they usually mean do it right.
My point to Ock was that 60,000 employed and growing to over 100,000.
I think the port is doing things just fine and Ferrin has an excellent grasp of the future.
Quote from: CS Foltz on December 08, 2009, 06:38:06 AM
The 9B Extension is designed solely for that container traffic
really?
so pl,ease explain why 9B has been in FDOT plans for over 15 years....and JaxPort never even looked at attracting container terminals until thsi decade.
Don't know anything about 9B in FDOT Plans for 15 years......Do know that Jaxport did not even consider Rail in any aspect until Public furor started that ball rolling! Current Administration was bound and determined to use 9A for container trucks and that started another furor over the numbers projected using 9A and the cost of rebuilding 9A to accommodate more trucks and then have to rebuild 9A again within 3 years and using Public Funds over and over to do this! Not very smart on the Boy Blunders part! You have half a**ed leadership, you get half a**ed solutions! Oh by the way........don't forget how the Dames Point Facility started........Eminent Domain and that one makes me wonder just what price for progress!