Port Authority, CSX discuss connection

[CS Foltz]

It just pains the hell out of me, since this discussion was on JOL several years ago! No rail connection but 9A was going to be upgraded and with the projected truck/container traffic, that original study showed 9A would have to be rebuilt again within 3 to 5 years...............taxpayers will be footing the bill for both times! Damn it man and here we go again! So much for the highly paid Jaxport administrators and look where we are now? OK ignore my rant......rail is a prerequisite for any port and container traffic should be for local dispatch only......within 100 mile radius..........anything beyond that should be railed to the closest hub and trucked from there! With the current City record of transparency,efficiency and accountability.......any agency tagged for that mandate needs to be separate!

[tufsu1]

Good call fieldafm, I'll toss in a full time "Jacksonville Railroad Authority," that might start as a one-person representative between City-Railroads and JTA-FDOT, then grow into a fully operational commuter rail-Freight/Port-LRT-STREETCAR agency. This would take the train set away from JTA, and properly hand it to the city for operations leaving JTA in a joint planning command.

There's a gentleman in Clay County running for commisioner(cant recall his name) that is advocating for a regional transportation strategy... Im starting to warm to the idea of a deicated regional rail transit organization.  

I would assume that is Doug Conkey...who is chair of the TPO....

btw, the idea is in process...and the Regional Transportation Study Commission will be getting started very soon

[Ocklawaha]

Good call fieldafm, I'll toss in a full time "Jacksonville Railroad Authority," that might start as a one-person representative between City-Railroads and JTA-FDOT, then grow into a fully operational commuter rail-Freight/Port-LRT-STREETCAR agency. This would take the train set away from JTA, and properly hand it to the city for operations leaving JTA in a joint planning command.

There's a gentleman in Clay County running for commisioner(cant recall his name) that is advocating for a regional transportation strategy... Im starting to warm to the idea of a deicated regional rail transit organization. 

Perhaps we can hunt him down and capture him! It would be cool perhaps, You, Lake, Commissioner-X, Myself and any other interested party's could start some brainstorming. I think that FSUJAX guy and maybe TUFSU, STEPHENDARE and ??

On the container front FEC is down for MUCH improvement, which boggles the mind as most railroaders know they have the best plant perhaps in all of the America's... (Well personally there is this 3' gauge stretch from PUERTO BERRIO TO SANTA MARTA Colombia... but I'll let that slide...") FEC is going to rebuild the Signal system AGAIN...

JACKSONVILLE needs a pow-wow with CSX on WHY THE HOME TEAM left us off the national corridor projects... YEAH, WE ALL KNOW WHY (read the damn thread) but it shouldn't be. So let's play dumb, Play catch-up, play beg, play borrow, play straight, play-dirty, cancel the Court House in it's tracks, kill the freaking freeway, wipe out the DOWNTOWN, GET R' DONE, ...and the play back will be years of unrestrained prosperity, jobs, and a building boom like we haven't seen since "QUEEN OF THE WINTER RESORTS," day's.

OCKLAWAHA

[Coolyfett]

Hell Yea

[Ocklawaha]

For those that dig bad news, you know that cut-off to Callahan, is just a cover for jobs going to WAYCROSS! The good new's is it will also mean jobs here at the port and yard, but after construction, one wonders how if ever it will be equalized?

IF we could "MAKE A DEAL" with CSX, oh hell, I don't know, like promise them a mile of riverfront, give away deep tax breaks, etc... and POW-WOW to bring CSX-NS-CSX together for a FLORIDA SUPER DISTRIBUTION "YARD*".

* As you all know I'm no fan of yards, neither are the railroads, cars in yards are racking up rental time and bringing in NOTHING! BUT! Somewhere out in the northwest side, with FEC able to reach it via their NS operating agreements (FEC RUNS THROUGH TO MACON NOW, AND NS RUNS THROUGH TO TITUSVILLE)...  consider a modern incarnation of bulk commodities, bulk terminals, TOFC/piggyback, road railer, containers... I'm talking a SUPER FACILITY that would dwarf BAILEY YARD ON THE UP (largest in the USA) designed not to store dead trains, but to roll em in, and right back out faster then any such facility in the world. In short a WORLD PROTOTYPE.

NEXT?

Yes, did you know there is a high power electric tower right-of-way that crosses the ST JOHNS at BLOUNT ISLAND. But these same power lines are where JAXPORT built the 15 mile BLOUNT ISLAND TERMINAL TRACKS...
As we've discussed, the tracks currently stop near Main and 9-A where it joins the CSX.

WHAT IF...?

We continued on, right up and over I-95, into the FREE TRADE ZONE at JIA, which the power lines miss by just a mile or two... CONTINUE on around the Northwest Side of town, to Westlake, the huge NS INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX being developed (sort of all alone ... like in the dark... HELLO CITY I LOVE-PULL YOUR HEAD OUT) but our happy power lines keep right on going across BEAVER and the CSX - S LINE, and pick up the right-of-way for CECIL FIELD... BINGO! We have just ridden the JACKSONVILLE BELT TERMINAL RAILROAD, a great place for my super yard. BTW Lake, toss in I-22 or the otherwise Florida-Georgia Parkway a direct KC-JAXPORT freeway first proposed back in the early 60's and nearly finished through large chunks of MO, AR, TN, MS, AL, and currently being "BENT" by Savannah as we have dropped off the radar... yet GA IS building 4 lane limited access from COLUMBUS-ALBANY-VALDOSTA... I'd like to see us revive it and BEND IT BACK!

OCKLAWAHA

[JeffreyS]

Good call fieldafm, I'll toss in a full time "Jacksonville Railroad Authority," that might start as a one-person representative between City-Railroads and JTA-FDOT, then grow into a fully operational commuter rail-Freight/Port-LRT-STREETCAR agency. This would take the train set away from JTA, and properly hand it to the city for operations leaving JTA in a joint planning command.

There's a gentleman in Clay County running for commisioner(cant recall his name) that is advocating for a regional transportation strategy... Im starting to warm to the idea of a deicated regional rail transit organization.  

Larry Williams.