Norfolk Southern to pay $1.6 billion to buy line from Cincinnati
NORFOLK SOUTHERN has reached agreement with the CITY OF CINCINNATI to buy the CINCINNATI SOUTHERN RAILWAY, the nation’s only municipally owned interstate rail line, for $1.6 billion. A subsidiary now owned by NS has leased and operated the 336-mile route from Cincinnati to Chattanooga, Tenn., since 1881. The sale must be approved by Cincinnati voters and the Surface Transportation Board, and will require legislative action by the Ohio General Assembly.
The COLORADO PACIFIC RAILROAD, a short line in the southeastern part of the state owned by billionaire Stefan Soloviev, made a late bid for $10.7 million to win a bankruptcy auction for the SAN LUIS & RIO GRANDE RAILROAD. Colorado rail holding company OMNITRAX had previously been set to purchase the 155-mile railroad — a former IOWA PACIFIC property in bankruptcy for three years — for a reported $5.75 million. Colorado Pacific operates a 156-mile route from Towner, Colo., near the Kansas state line, to a junction near Pueblo, and also made an effort to force UNION PACIFIC to sell it the mothballed Tennessee Pass line in 2021.
MONTANA RAIL LINK began the regulatory process involved in turning its lines back over to BNSF RAILWAY, asking the SURFACE TRANSPORTATION BOARD in a Nov. 18 filing for permission to discontinue service over 656.47 miles of track in Montana and Idaho, as part of the early termination of its lease with BNSF. The lease had been slated to run through 2047. The process is expected to take four or five months, with an STB decision expected in the second quarter of 2023. MRL’s filing with the STB came after BNSF reached agreements with the nine unions that represent Montana Rail Link employees.
Bill Sheffield, who as governor led the state purchase of the ALASKA RAILROAD from the federal government, saving the line from being shut down, died Nov. 4 at age 94. Sheffield was a driving force behind the 1982 purchase of the railroad for $22 million. Sheffield went on to serve as the railroad’s president, CEO, and board chairman, and at the time of his death was board chair emeritus.