BALTIMORE — CSX began the long-awaited Howard Street Tunnel clearance project on Saturday (Feb. 1), when the 8,700-foot tunnel was closed to allow crews to remove track as the first step in construction work.
“This is a tremendous opportunity to alleviate a restriction on our network and open up new opportunities for CSX,” Ed Sparks, CSX chief engineer of bridge design and construction, said in a video the railroad posted on Monday, Feb. 3, 2025. “We’re starting something big today.”
The tunnel will remain closed to allow construction crews to lower the floor by 2 feet, which will create the clearance necessary to permit double-stack trains to use the Baltimore & Ohio tunnel that opened in 1895. Work within the tunnel is part of an overall $566 million project to raise clearances on CSX between Philadelphia and Baltimore.
CSX expects to wrap up clearance work in the tunnel by the end of the year. Freight traffic is being detoured while the tunnel is closed [see “CSX to detour traffic over Norfolk Southern …,” Trains News Wire, Sept. 26, 2024].
The clearance project will allow CSX to operate double-stack intermodal trains in its I-95 Corridor as well as create an efficient double-stack route to the Seagirt Marine Terminal Intermodal Container Transfer Facility at the Port of Baltimore.
CSX began double-stack service to the port in October after clearance work was completed on bridges between Philadelphia and Baltimore. The service links the port with Chicago and other Midwestern destinations — but via the roundabout Philadelphia-New Jersey-Selkirk, N.Y.-Cleveland route. “The out-of-route miles are tremendous,” CSX CEO Joe Hinrichs said on the railroad’s earnings call last month.
Once the Howard Street Tunnel clearance is raised from the current 19 feet, 6 inches, double-stack trains from the Port of Baltimore will be able to take the direct route to the Midwest via the former Baltimore & Ohio main line through Cumberland, Md., over the Sand Patch grade, and on through Pittsburgh to Chicago.
CSX also will be able to use more cost-effective, double-stack intermodal service along the East Coast, which executives say will make the service more competitive. Overall, CSX expects the Howard Street Tunnel project to allow the railroad to gain an additional 75,000 to 125,000 loads annually within three years.
CSX initially had planned on using 12-hour work windows in the tunnel so that freight traffic could continue to move during the project. But that would require the removal of track to allow daily construction work to take place, followed by installation of panel track so trains could roll through the tunnel at night.
“This project was initially planned to take three years and create extensive daily track outages over one of our key corridors,” Chief Operating Officer Mike Cory said on the railroad’s earnings call. “I’m extremely proud of the team for being able to turn this around from a three year project to one that will take six to eight months for the tunnel to be operational. We benefit from this improvement forever and far faster than originally planned.”
Cory says safety remains a top priority. “We have a lot of people on this property, not all of them CSX employees, but we’re all one team,” Cory says. “We want this to be a completely injury- and accident-free project. It’s important to work safely, work smart, and look out for one another.”
The tunnel reconstruction is part of a larger partnership involving CSX, the U.S. Department of Transportation, Maryland, and Pennsylvania.
The overall project consists of vertical clearance improvements at 22 locations on CSX between Baltimore and Philadelphia. CSX began construction in Pennsylvania in 2022 and has been working its way south. The clearance projects north of the Howard Street Tunnel were completed in October.
Lowering the track 2 feet brings up a couple questions.
1. Will the lowering at the south end require some new wall work that separates the track from the passenger station.
2. At the north end will the closed Howard Street passenger terminal be reduced or demolished or can work be done to preserve the station & canopy? Is the station a listed property? Is the canopy high enough that it will not need to be raised?
3. Has CSX made any plans in the unlikely event any part of the detour route becomes unusable for more than a couple days?