Bastrop, Tx–A local transportation study group is set to hear Friday from state officials looking into the feasibility of moving heavy rail freight traffic away from cities in the area, including Bastrop and possibly Elgin.
For more than a year planners from the Texas Department of Transportation, local officials and area residents have mostly focused on needed highway improvements. Now their attention has turned to the future of rail traffic through the area.
The Friday rail session is slated for 10 a.m. in the Commissioners Courtroom on the second floor of the Courthouse Annex at 804 Pecan St. in Bastrop. The public is invited and a quorum of county commissioners may attend the session, said Gayle Wilhelm, an assistant to Bastrop County Judge Ronnie McDonald.
The possibility of moving heavy rail traffic off the 1886 route through Bastrop’s old town core has raised questions about what property might be affected by a new rail alignment, possibly between the present route of FM 20 and Texas 304, areas now slated for significant commercial and residential development.
Elgin officials are also interested in regional rail plans because of the potential to convert a freight rail line from Austin to Elgin and Giddings for use by commuter trains at some time in the future.
The present rail line through Bastrop sends trains laden with coal, gravel, industrial chemicals and other agricultural and manufactured goods between the main high school campus and the West Campus or 9th Grade Center on Hill Street on a daily basis. The Union Pacific line through Bastrop is part of a main line between the Midwest and Mountain West and the port at Houston on the Gulf Coast.
Can you post, or link to, maps which show the locations, routes, etc of existing rail lines in Bastrop County, and maps or projections of where new rail lines will be or are proposed to be?
Then, can you post, or link to, maps which show the locations, relative to both existing and proposed rail lines, of some of the huge developments being proposed for Bastrop County, including air ports, rural subdivisions, and industrial parks?
thank you
“The present rail line through Bastrop sends trains laden with coal, gravel, industrial chemicals and other agricultural and manufactured goods ….”
This is true of almost all towns which have railroads running through them. The two lines which traverse Austin could be described in this same way, as can, of course, the lines that cross in downtown Elgin.
I think this situation is not sufficient basis for undertaking a costly, disruptive, massive re-alignment of the roadbeds. The goal, I suppose, would be to run those trains through the “deserted” countryside. Well, the countryside is not deserted; people who live there do so by choice to avoid the noise of railroads, to some extent. Moving rail lines to sparsely inhabited areas of the County just moves the problem into the back yards of people who have tried to avoid such things.
If there are significant potentials for disasters in the rail corridor through town, the best way to deal with it is to assure the integrity of the roadbed and to put a slow order on the passage of trains through town.
Doran raises questions, hints at arguments:
I’m not a good Web searcher, but the TxDOT
web site does have a “Central Texas Rail Relocation Study” from July 2008. Part of the impetus for calling the Friday meeting, I think, is to see if there’s anything new or ongoing since then.
Relocating rail lines, needless to say, is expensive. I take no position on what might be good or sufficient reasons for any such undertaking. I think the whole topic took form as Gov. Perry began to push for his misbegotten Trans-Texas Corridor plans, which, of course, included rail components. A review of potential T-TC routes may give some hint at where relocated rail lines might be contemplated, possibly anywhere from SH 130 to somewhere east of Bastrop for one segment, as I recall.
As to Bastrop itself, no, its railroad situation is not particularly unusual, except that the main line divides the high school campus. That situation, of course, was created by the local school board in the 1980s when the new high school was built between the railroad and Chambers St., just west of Tx 95.–dmc
“Bastrop” needs to figure out how to move vehicle traffic on Hwy 21 now that the poorly accessed Bastrop Memorial Stadium is up and running. That is the trouble with government – they work full time, on our dime, to figure out ways to spend money.
The present band aid road fix on Hwy 21 will hardly improve the situation during home games.
On the other hand, perhaps the train tracks could be routed near the stadium and folks could take the train to the games. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”