Federal regulators had approved the sale of 373 miles of CSX Transportation trackage across the Florida Panhandle, effective Jan. 6, but CSX and short line operator RailUSA scuttled their deal last week.
“CSX and RailUSA were unable to come to terms on a transaction for CSX tracks through the Florida Panhandle,” CSX said in a statement. “CSX will continue to evaluate options for the rail line and will continue communicating with customers, union representatives, and employees as we move forward.”
In November regulatory filings with the Surface Transportation Board, RailUSA said it would acquire CSX’s Tallahassee Subdivision between Baldwin, Fla., and Chattahoochee, Fla., the P&A Subdivision between Chattahoochee and Pensacola, Fla., and portions of the Bainbridge Subdivision between Tallahassee and Attapulgus, Ga.
The Florida Gulf & Atlantic planned to hire 37 people in Tallahassee to run the railroad.
Florida Gulf & Atlantic was to be the second acquisition for RailUSA, a new company headed by Gary Marino, an industry veteran who founded shortline holding companies RailAmerica and Patriot Rail. RailUSA is a subsidiary of International Rail Partners. Both companies are based in Boca Raton, Fla.
The Panhandle route once hosted Amtrak’s Sunset Limited, which ran between Orlando, Fla., and Los Angeles. It was cut back to a New Orleans-Los Angeles routing after Hurricane Katrina damaged Gulf Coast trackage east of New Orleans in 2005.
The line currently is Class 4 trackage with maximum speeds of 60 mph for freight trains. CSX has rerouted most through traffic off the Panhandle line to its parallel route via Waycross, Ga., and Montgomery, Ala.
RailUSA officials did not immediately respond to a Trains email seeking comment.
It was unclear whether the government shutdown — which includes the STB — would have an impact on CSX’s ability to spin off the line to a new operator.
The line sale was scheduled to be the second in CSX’s line-rationalization program. The first was the Decatur & Eastern Illinois Railroad, which Watco began operating in September.
I am guessing its the same old issue. The new carrier wants CSX to contribute to a bridge maintenance fund to offset deferred maintenance and CSX says “sure, but the price just went up”. Same thing that killed parts of the Monon when the Indiana RR took it over. INDR couldn’t find any online customers to offset the CSX charges, so they abandoned it.
Bravo Mr. Jaeger! Exactly my point with the removal of the Perry Cut Off and Ocala Division. Nothing like moving time sensitive freight around Robin Hood’s barn in Century 21!
Thanks, Robert! Even with a Valdosta-Waycross link, the bow line is a pretty circuitous route for traffic between New Orleans/Mobile and the southeast.
The concept of the state of Florida acquiring the panhandle route is intriguing. I don’t see it likely, however, in the state’s current political environment and especially if passenger service is part of the package. Florida is very much a red state right now, and the Koch brothers would be all over this.
to Steve Jaeger: Traffic doesn’t have to go up as far as La Grange, Ga. A section of the former ACL “Bow Line”, from Waycross to Valdosta, has been inadverdently left out of the above map. Although I don’t remember if there is a shorter route from Flomaton to the ‘Bow Line’, or traffic really does have to go as far as Montgomery before turning south to WAYX and on to JAX. (I used to work on SCL between WAYX and Thomasville, trains continuing on to the midwest, including the once a week midwest ‘auto train’ and Amtraks CHI-MIA train)
Atlantic Coast Line constructed the one time Perry Cut-Off to shorten the run time for freight moving to/from the Tampa Bay/lower west coast region. Now all shipments from the lower U.S. gulf coast, mid-west, west, etc. must move east, then south to Lakeland, then west again to reach the Tampa Bay area. Even the ACL Ocala Division and SAL’s line to Brooksville, both which ran north out of Tampa are long gone. Of course the absence of these routes pose little problem today due to the fact Seaboard Coast Line effectively ran off most of their rail business which the motor carriers wasted no time picking up.
Item: This places the ports at Tampa and Manatee at a huge disadvantage compared to east coast ports simply because FEC can move freight and containers out of Florida at a much faster pace. SCL’s massive cost cutting measures that included lifting multitudes of track in and around Tampa Bay has returned to haunt CSX. Check the map and you’ll discover that not so much as one time saving trunk line remains to move traffic due north in and out of this ever growing area today.
This is Century 21 progress at it’s very best!
Looks like the CSX liquidation sale is on hold! Hunter would be pissed!
Thanks to those of you who are remain well informed about railroad history and are always willing to share it with those of us who seem to have have forgotten much of it. I’m always first in line to learn and/or be re-educated on these subjects not to mention it’s been a good number of years since I read the history pertaining to the roads down South.
The “parallel line” via Montgomery to which CSX has routed most through traffic has to be at least 150 miles longer than the Tallahassee/P&A subs if you’re running a train from, say, Mobile to the big yard at Waycross. You’re moving northeast to LaGrange, GA (almost to Atlanta) & then back down to Waycross in southeast Georgia. I have heard that the panhandle line is a maintenance headache with many lift bridges but, good God, something must be motivating CSX to dump this route. What gives?
Alexander, “lucrative” is an understatement regarding the value of the land that was once occupied by Potomac Yard in Alexandria. It would take a lot to convince someone that a major double-hump classification yard used to be there.
Amen Mr. Landey.
What a shame, CSX will need to run its own railroad. Part of its plan to entirely liquidate has fallen through.
I’m starting to wonder if CSX and Amtrak are the same railroad.
Yes, Jeffrey, the state of North Carolina, which built the railroad from Goldsboro to Greensboro and down to Charlotte–still owns the railroad.
https://www.ncrr.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/NCRR-History-Narrative.pdf
The original Norfolk Southern was built from Norfolk to Raleigh and then on to Charlotte a little more directly than the NC RR built. As well as I can tell,it never had much traffic between Raleigh and Charlotte.
Charles:
At the end of its existence, the RF&P was owned by CSX, NS, and VA. NS sold out in exchange for trackage rights through DC. VA Retirement system sold the rail operations to CSX and kept the more lucrative real estate part of the RF&P, which still functions as a real estate firm, I believe. Part of the deal is VRE commuter service would operate from Fredricksburg north to DC.
Penelope, I believe you have your story backwards. North Carolina built, owned, and operated the NC Railroad between 1851 and 1871. The Richmond and Danville, which later became part of the Southern Railway, leased the NC from 1871 to 1894. In 1894, the Southern leased the NC for 99 years. The Norfolk Southern has continued the lease. .
Joseph-
The Georgia RR has never been owned by the State. Here is information from Robert Hanson, Railroad Historian and author of the book The Georgia Railroad:
The Georgia Railroad was owned by the Georgia Railroad and Banking Company from its inception in 1834 (Chartered in December 1833, organized in March of 1834.) until it was purchased from the bank by CSX Corporation through its subsidiary, Seaboard Coast Line Railroad, in November of 1982. It was absorbed, along with the SCL, L&N, numerous other railroads, into the Seaboard System Railroad on January 1, 1983.
That paragraph covers ownership of the road for all 149 years of its existence.
At no time was it owned by the State of Georgia.
Bob
Joseph –
RF&P stayed independent for a number of years because everyone had a piece of it, the connecting railroads and the Commonwealth of Virginia.
My memory (just that) is that the Commonwealth of Virginia, (later, the Virginia state retirement system) owned a minority stake in RF&P alongside other stakes held by railroad connections to the north and to the south of RF&P. The CSX merger of two of the railroad connections to the north (Chessie) and south (Seabord System) gave CSX a majority control, or at least a controlling minority. I don’t remember what happened, at that point, to the remaining minority owners, like if they sold out to CSX or if they still own a stake.
If anyone has better information, please correct.
Now, Herb, that won’t get us a sub-60 OR, now will it
I am interested what the status of the onetime State of Georgia owned Georgia Railroad as well as the RF&P which was owned by the State of Virginia. Did these states retain legal rights to repurchase these historic carriers back from CSX in the event it failed to operate and maintain them to Class One standards?
This type of transaction is proof positive that CSX either doesn’t want to, or doesn’t know how’ (or both) to operate low volume, low margin trackage. Traffic is captive at either end, so they have nothing to lose from that perspective. They are freed of operating and equipment expense plus ROW maintainance. If a shortline succeeds in building traffic, CSX comes out ahead . If, however, they strangle the shortline in it’s crib by erratic or unreliable service, everyone loses. Discretionary shippers who have a choice won’t tolerate service levels CSX has earned a reputation for. I would humbly suggest that as a (nominally) regulated public utility, any railroad should provide a reasonable level of service to shippers on an avoidable cost basis, defined as a tariff that captures operating costs plus capital recovery of ROW and equipment.
Here is an opportunity for the State of Florida to acquire the line for use by Amtrak and CSX as North Carolina has done with leasing a former Southern Railway line back to Norfolk Southern between Charlotte and Raleigh. It would be similar to owning state highways except the line would be for trains. Each railway entity pays a fee for use and maintenance.