Fairbanks Transportation Committee votes to put $2 million toward Southern Bypass planning
Published Monday, June 23, 2008
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Transportation officials took steps last week to advance a plan to reroute almost 20 miles of train track in Fairbanks, North Pole and in between.
The group, the Fairbanks Metropolitan Area Transportation Systems Policy Committee, voted Wednesday to set aside $1 million apiece for two legs of a proposed reroute project — one leg near North Pole and the other around Fairbanks — that has sent a charge through parts of town during the past year.
“The vote was an important step to commit the community to continue to fund the project,” said Bruce Carr, the Alaska Railroad Corp.’s strategic planning director.
Carr said half the money would be enough to complete the risk-related environmental reports for a section of the project running from North Pole to Milepost 9 on the Richardson Highway between the cities. Carr said if the Federal Railroad Administration views that section as distinct from the rest of the larger, Fairbanks-area reroute project, the state railroad corporation could begin to move track and eliminate crossings in three years.
The other half of the money would be a down payment on what would be a huge reroute. The proposal, commonly referred to as the Southern Bypass, aims to lay new track along the southern fringe of Fairbanks and remove it from neighborhoods in northeast Fairbanks.
Railroad officials think just the planning for a Southern Bypass project — which, if possible, would eliminate all but a few road-to-rail crossings in Fairbanks and on Fort Wainwright — could cost tens of millions of dollars. The entire bypass could cost hundreds of millions to actually build.
Despite the massive effort the Southern Bypass project would require, its prospect has galvanized a group of local officials and residents, who have pushed the railroad to do more to prepare. The railroad’s train tracks run through and near residential and retail neighborhoods in northeast Fairbanks, a section of town that has grown in recent years.
“This is one of the major safety issues in the state of Alaska,” said Don Lowell, a member of the Rail Safety and Development Group who has advocated for the bypass route.
A pair of local elected officials joined the area’s trio of mayors on the seven-member committee in supporting the proposed financial transfer. Representatives from the state’s departments of Environmental Conservation and Transportation and Public Facilities objected, saying they wanted more information about whether the combined $2 million — money that originated as federal highway funding but which local officials have indicated is fairly flexible — could legally be transferred to a railroad project.
Supporters said they hoped local support for the Southern Bypass proposal — money that would go toward an Environmental Impact Statement — sends a signal to other agencies to do more to advance the project.
Carr said the North Pole leg of the reroute project would come years before a bypass or a similar reroute in the city of Fairbanks. Rerouting track in the North Pole area, he said, would eliminate all but one of the 13 active road to rail crossings in or near North Pole, while a future reroute around Fairbanks would have a similar impact in that city.
But the railroad, which joined the borough last year to “aggressively pursue funding” for a Southern Bypass reroute, would also need to find money to build the North Pole-area realignment.
“We don’t have the million dollars yet,” he said of the money for planning.
The committee’s Wednesday vote would transfer $2 million in federal highway funds from a now-dormant plan to rebuild University Avenue — a project that could receive millions of dollars via a statewide bond package later this year — toward the railroad reroute.
Donna Gardino, a coordinator for the local transportation system, said public officials will ensure the money can be transferred before incorporating the switch into a long-term transportation-funding schedule. She said the money could be available in December or possibly sooner for the railroad to use.
Community Discussion
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“This is one of the major safety issues in the state of Alaska,” said Don Lowell
Really? When was the last train/vehicle collision in the Borough? When was the last railroad hazardous material spill in the Borough? If it so unsafe, maybe extra precautions should be taken to improve the safety of the current operation?
I agree it will be safer, but to declare it one of the major safety issues in the State is pretty silly, and it makes me wonder what you are trying to cloak with that comment.
Actually more rail should be built in the core Fairbanks area. Ever here of mass transit? Why not extend the rail from the trainer gate area to down town for light rail mass transit?
We actually need some more level headed planning for the railroad. Not just the let's just move it around 'cause it's been here for so long thinking.
We have children living with no supervision and grants to the agencies that serve them are cut. We have homeless people camping out around town and chronic inebriates living on the streets. Hundreds of dogs and cats are euthanized each year because their owners refuse to restrain them and the borough shelter cannot accommodate them on a long-term basis. Seniors and the disabled are experiencing hardships in these tough economic times. Thousands of people have no health insurance or inadequate insurance. The federal debt is at an all-time high. And this is what we are spending money on? Yes, it is inconvenient to wait for a train to pass. But really....
outraged_ what could be the hidden conspiracy? If we tell them that this intersection is more dangerous then maybe they wont read about a accident at this one; seriously, come on. A group of people looked at intersections that have a potential dangers with the railroad (remember that well Don Lowell said those things he was wearing his hat for the rail safety development group, only being asked to see part of the picture that would be affected by rail tracks not all intersections like he hopefully would as a representative of our city or borough) No hidden messages, a specific hypothesis with a specific question having specific answers about one subject, railroad and road intersections.
I am fully in line with this reroute, to me it sounds great; as long as the "sound" from the bypass is addressed at the same time. I live downtown and can hear the train when the ice fog locks the sound inside the valley like it was in my front yard. Are they going to raise the tracks so that the noise will be above us or are they going to build a barrier wall near the residential areas similar to what they did around the highways in California? Which is more cost effective? Which will be less of an intrusion? If there are issues that people have with these ideas now is the time to say something because in a couple of years they will be doing it.
Well, I can think of one time last year when an SUV ran into a train at a North Pole crossing; the driver reportedly said, "I didn't know there was a crossing there." On another day, I was talking to someone about school buses getting rear ended at the crossings on the Steese and Old Steese Highways, and later that day, another got rear ended on the Old Steese; within a few days of that, another was. It's about time people woke up to how lucky we've all been to have not had major accidents with the trains/vehicles/pedestrians/toxic materials. It also makes sense to spend a miniscule amount of brain time (all it would take) looking at the constant potential for accidents between children and other pedestrians and the trains, which run right through our most traveled areas. I asked an AK RR employee once how long it would take to stop the average loaded freight train and he said, "A mile and a half."
You can hear the trains from up on Steele Creek Rd. You can hear them over on the Parks Hwy. You can hear them from Farmer's Loop. You can hear them. It may be a problem (sort of; I grew up within earshot of train tracks and loved the rhythmic lulling of the few trains - and how many trains do we have per day? How spoiled can you get?) - but nowhere near the problem that it would be to have your son or daughter squashed between a tanker car and someone's SUV.
How about getting some of those small one car or two passenger trains trying to help with peoples commute. Run a train from UAF to the downtown station. Or one from Nenana to Fairbanks. It wouldn't hurt to have the railroad have more use for the local public, and not just tourists and freight.
I can't keep quiet any longer. I am a rail fan, however I think ARR, the borough and the city have their collective heads in their rears. Everybody spouts "safety and future needs".
The time has come to re-route the rails from Nenena to Fairbanks to North pole and beyond ALL along the flats. This will solve all the problems - No grade crossings, no noise, no conflicts with the riverboat, access for the military to the training areas and the beginings of the rail to Canada.
To those at the ARR, you can't take one groups problems and just pass them on to another area of the community.
People of Fairbanks now is the time to set the direction of the future. Make the re-routing a true southern route.
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