Track to be Removed at Buckeye Yard

An online report said Norfolk Southern is soliciting bids from contractors to remove about 64 miles of track from Buckeye Yard in Columbus.

Bids are due on Nov. 11 and a pre-bidding meeting and inspection of the site will be conducted on Nov. 4.

The bidders will also have to cleanup the site after tracks are removed.

NS largely idled Buckeye, located on the west side of Columbus, in May 2009. However, the Camp Chase Industrial Railroad had been interchanging with NS in the yard and CSX had intermodal operations there. However, the Camp Chase-NS interchange has reportedly been moved in recent months to a point closer to NS’s Watkins Yard in Columbus.

The yard was built by Penn Central in 1969.

Minnesota Museum Wants ex-GN Car in Columbus

A Minnesota museum is seeking to raise money to move a former Great Northern passenger car from its current location in Columbus.

The Minnesota Transportation Museum wants to move Empire Builder “Ranch” lounge White Pines Lake, which is now sitting at The Depot Event Center in Columbus.

The owners of the car have agreed to donate it to the Minnesota museum when the latter is able to pay to move it.

The museum is trying to raise $50,000 through a Go Fund Me page and grants.

Once funding is secured the car will be moved to St. Paul, Minnesota, by truck and rail.

The museum owns three other ex-GM passengers cars that were built in 1951 for the Empire Builder.

Indiana May Repeal Light Rail Ban for Indianapolis

In an effort to woo a $5 billion Amazon headquarters, the Indiana General Assembly is moving to repeal a law banning light rail from the Indianapolis metropolitan area.

A House committee voted 11-1 this week in favor of legislation to repeal a 2014 law that bars state or local governments from spending money on light rail projects in the seven-county region surrounding Indianapolis.

The effort to repeal the law gained impetus when Amazon recently named Indianapolis one of 20 finalists for its second headquarters.

Also on the list are Chicago, Pittsburgh and Columbus. Cleveland applied for the headquarters but did not make the latest cut.

One of the criteria being used by Amazon to choose what is being termed HQ2 is good public transportation, including rail transportation.

Indianapolis has a bus system but not a rail transit system and there are no current plans to create one.

Amazon is headquartered in Seattle. Dozens of cities in the United States and Canada are eagerly seeking the Amazon headquarters because it promises to provide more than 50,000 jobs with average salaries of more than $100,000 annually.

“Transit is a very major factor for a lot of these major companies that are looking to move here,” said the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Justin Moed (D-Indianapolis).

The 2014 law banning light rail was rooted in a belief by fiscal conservatives that a light rail system would require a taxpayer bailout due to its high costs.

The conservative lawmakers demanded the light rail ban as the price for their support of a measure to allow Indiana counties to increase incomes taxes through referendum for public transit projects.

Columbus Wins Smart City Challenge

Columbus has won the Smart City Challenge offered by the U.S. Department of Transportation and will receive millions of dollars in federal grant money to be used to reshape its transportation system.

The city has already raised $90 million that will be supplemented with up to $40 million from U.S. DOT and up to $10 million from Vulcan, Incorporated.

In reshaping its transportation network, Columbus officials will be expected to integrate innovative technologies and use data, technology and creativity “to re-imagine how people and goods” move through the city.

Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther said in a news release that the city is collaborating with public, private and nonprofit sectors.

“Smart Columbus will deliver an unprecedented multimodal transportation system that will not only benefit the people of central Ohio, but potentially all mid-sized cities,” he said.

Columbus nudged out Austin, Texas; Denver; Kansas City, Missouri; Pittsburgh; Portland, Oregon; and San Francisco for the award.

In a statement, U.S. Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx said that finalists provided “thoughtful, intelligent, and innovative ideas that defined a vision for the future of the American city and formed a blueprint to show the world what a fully integrated, forward-looking transportation network looks like.

“The bold initiatives they proposed demonstrated that the future of transportation is not just about using technology to make our systems safer and more efficient – it’s about using these advanced tools to make life better for all people, especially those living in under served communities.”