Charleston mayor seeking state help to avoid rail yard traffic tie-ups
David Wren — The Post and Courier
With the city of Charleston set to bear the brunt of impacts from a planned rail yard serving a future port terminal, Mayor John Tecklenburg wants the state to pay $55 million to help solve traffic jams he says are inevitable when trains start moving cargo.
"The state found $300 million to build a port access road," Tecklenburg said this week, referring to construction of a road that will connect Interstate 26 to a container terminal the State Ports Authority is building on the former Navy base in North Charleston.
The traffic concerns are "on the same order of magnitude when it comes to impact," he said during a meeting of the Propeller Club of Charleston.
The most pressing need, according to a recent city study, is an overpass that would let vehicles move along Meeting Street while miles-long trains hauling goods to and from the rail yard travel unimpeded below.
Without an overpass, the trains will halt Meeting Street traffic at crossings between Herbert and Milford streets. That has the potential to disrupt commerce and cut off public safety services to some residents.
"We’ve got to be able to get policemen and firemen and emergency personnel to serve our citizens when there's a call," Tecklenburg said. "It's a no-brainer."
Mitigating factors
The overpass, at a projected cost of nearly $40 million, is one of several improvements the study suggests to mitigate the rail yard's impacts. Other, less costly, ideas include intersection improvements, street extensions and a turn lanes.
The city's study estimates 10,900 vehicles travel each day along Meeting Street in that area.
For most of the nearly decade the $130 million rail yard has been planned, the focus on traffic has centered on North Charleston. That changed a year ago when Norfolk Southern and CSX — the two railroads that would use the Navy base yard — said they don't want a planned northern access that would send trains through the Park Circle area.
Instead, they want access from the south, moving through the Charleston Neck area. While CSX already has a rail loop through that part of the city, Norfolk Southern wants to duplicate it with a second line.
Despite their plans for all-south access, a permit application for the rail yard — filed by project builder Palmetto Railways, a division of the state Commerce Department — continues to show trains entering and exiting the site from both directions.
The rail yard is scheduled to open in 2019, and there are concerns revising the application to show just a southern access could delay the permit and, possibly, financing.
Tecklenburg met this month with state Commerce Secretary Bobby Hitt to discuss how road improvements could be funded, but little progress was made. Instead of the $55 million Tecklenburg sought, Hitt said the department could offer $4 million.
"Understandably, they don’t have a budget that would allow full mitigation of what we’re talking about," Tecklenburg said. "I believe we need to go a little broader, to other state agencies."
Ultimately, Tecklenburg said, it might be up to the Legislature to find a way to pay.
“I feel strongly that the city of Charleston needs more than just a commitment to agree, we need to be able to rely on some funding to make these things happen,” he said.
Tecklenburg said the trains also could disrupt regional plans for a Bus Rapid Transit plan to create an express public transportation route between Summerville and Charleston. That plan, to be funded by a half-percent sales tax increase, would send buses making limited stops along some of the same roads that would be affected by the rail yard.
“It’s hard for me to imagine that we could keep a BRT system moving rapidly unless, at a bare minimum, we have an overpass over those rail lines where those two-mile-long trains will be going,” he said.
An alternative being studied by area governments would be to transfer the bus route to King Street by widening that road to four lanes and making it, instead of Meeting Street, the main thoroughfare between Charleston and communities to the north. However, that would require right-of-way acquisitions and construction that could push the cost of the project to $100 million or more.
"It would cost a lot more money, but maybe in the long term it makes more sense," Tecklenburg said.
Long process
Patrick Barber, owner of North Charleston trucking firm Superior Transportation, said he favors the King Street plan, adding it likely qualifies for funding through the State Infrastructure Bank, which helps finance major transportation projects.
"This is an easy solution here and we’re making a mountain out of a mole hill," said Barber, a Propeller Club member. "King Street solves all the problems. ... All of these issues with emergency response would go away if King Street went to four lanes."
Tecklenburg said he continues to work with state and local governments on finding solutions, and money, but expects it will be a long process. And while the King Street plan "is my preference," he said, a Meeting Street overpass will be needed even if the focus shifts toward creating a new gateway to the city.
"It’s going to take a real team effort to plan all this," he said.
The rail yard would take up about half of Palmetto Railroad's 240-acre tract on the former Navy base. It will employ up to about 120 workers and handle 1.1 million containers annually.
The facility is a key element of the SPA's $2 billion capital improvement plan and a way to minimize truck traffic. Nearly one out of every four cargo boxes passing through the Port of Charleston moves by rail — more than double the number since 2009.
