By now we've all see situations of this sort. The line in question is a part of the former PRR Akron Branch. In its day this line allowed for PRR trains (on the old Cleveland & Pittsburgh RR) to connect Cleveland to Akron, Columbus and such.
The rails have been unused for nearly forty years and about twenty years ago there was talk of a dinner train on the line to be operated by Akron Metro RTA.
Now a young entrepreneur wants to re-open 12-15 miles of the line for freight service and car storage. The owner of the line (Akron Metro RTA) and the bedroom communities through which it passes prefer a recreational trail, instead. There isn't room for both because it's a single track line. Norfolk Southern apparently has an interest or say in this, too.
Here's the article from today's Akron Beacon Journal:
https://www.beaconjournal.com/story/news/local/2020/12/04/company-eyes-reactivating-rail-line-small-freight-train-operation-summit-county/3811528001/
Isn't this another situation where the tracks and the land are owned by a public agency? It was stated the NS has a small ownership in the line. But does that mean that it owns a small percentage of the entire line or maybe just a couple of miles where it owns 100%?
I guess if they want to make it into a trail and it's owned by a public agency, I'm not sure how much leverage the fledging rail operation would have.
Isn't this kinda what happened in upstate New York? The railway wanted to keep the entire line but the track was actually owned by a New York State agency.
Now, if the planned railroad would buy the line en toto from the RTA, and assuming the STB green lights the operation, I can't see how the trail proponets could succeed at that point. But I'm not sure that's the case here.
This will probably be a messy one. Anecdotal evidence says abandoned 1991. The line originally was not supposed to be included into ConRail (LC 2421) and then got chopped-up by floods [ PC-1969] and never repaired.
Documenting what actually happened because the bulk of this is not easy to find in records of the STB (1976-1996 microfilm "donut-hole") where ICC bet on the wrong technology and made searching for data rediculously hard. I can see all sides getting brutalized on this one. The Hudson & Southern people sound like they are in over their heads.
Could be another mess like Geneva, Oh [Norwalk Secondary] or Youngstown (Y&S).
mudchickenThis will probably be a messy one. Anecdotal evidence says abandoned 1991. The line originally was not supposed to be included into ConRail (LC 2421) and then got chopped-up by floods [ PC-1969] and never repaired. Documenting what actually happened because the bulk of this is not easy to find in records of the STB (1976-1996 microfilm "donut-hole") where ICC bet on the wrong technology and made searching for data rediculously hard. I can see all sides getting brutalized on this one. The Hudson & Southern people sound like they are in over their heads. Could be another mess like Geneva, Oh [Norwalk Secondary] or Youngstown (Y&S).
Remember the thunderstorms that struck NE Ohio on, as I recall, July 4, 1969 - Personally I was on my honeymoon in Daytona Beach - however when I returned to work, as a extra operator, I was assigned to open a Temporary Train Order Station at Boughtonville, OH - several miles East of Willard. The flash floods from the thunderstoms had wash out the #1 track bridge over a small stream, the #2 track bridge was OK. Since it would be a period of time for the #1 track bridge to be removed and rebuilt a TTOS was created to handle Train Orders and switches for a temporary 'shoo-fly' for WB trains to operate on #2 track over the good bridge and then go back on #1 track to continue to Willard
Now that I have set the stage - in working and living in the Akron area I never heard of the PRR having any flooding issues with the Hudson to Akron portion of their line from Hudson through Akron to Warwick and beyond. (note - PRR Dispatched the line from JO Tower in Akron to Warwick as a double track railroad (B&O owned one track, PRR the other). A situation that was mirrored on the PRR's line between Newark and Columbus, OH where each carrier owned one of the tracks and the B&O Dispatched it.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Balt: Line barely is mentioned in the USRA Final System Plan (Pg 267)...What flows through the stack of stuff I have access to talks about this line as part of a second / backdoor access to Columbus from Cleveland that PC could not afford to repair after 1969. (With USRA LC 2421 going from Hudson to Akron to Arlington*) Local traffic was not enough - demoting it to low density.
There has to be a FD- or AB- docket to cover and explain how the line got into Metro's hands, but it has yet to surface. If you can't find the docket, you cannot see if there is an NITU attached for rails-to-trails purposes. If there is no NITU, then there is the very real possibility that there is R/W with underlying real estate that has color of title reverted to an adjoining landowner. Messy - could thwart the plans of both the start-up railroad or the trail authority (Metro) ... If it did abandon in 1991, it's a replay of the Peoria Heights/CRIP boondoggle. I suspect the start-up and the Metro Agency do not have the documentation and are tap- dancing out in a minefield.
(and I've seen CR screw up plenty in my line of work because it was sell it first/ details later and lack of follow through with them)
* MP 11.4 in Akron (B&O, Ohio Canal crossing), start-up goes from MP 0 to MP 6
Edit: a lot more digging and with the help of a 2005 Ohio Supreme court case involving a dinner train (Adrian & Blissfield RR/ Cuyahoga Falls & Hudson Ry Co.), we stumble backwards in the Federal Register upon an ICC docket where Conrail abandoned in 1994 between MP 1.45/Hudson and MP 8.00/ Cuyagoga Falls at AB-167_(1142)......[FR Doc. 94-28454 Filed 11-16-94; 8:45 am].....Effective 11/10/94
"The abandonment is subject to an historic preservation condition, a trail use condition, a public use condition,and standard labor protective conditions."
The 2006 Ohio Supreme Court Case (Village of Silver Lake vs. METRO) killed the dinner train because it was not transit oriented under the terms of how the line was bought from CR. Railcar storage is transit oriented?
The plot thickens. (and the website font function croaks)
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