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Re: Spokane airport spur // Is there a "real" rail customer?
Author: BOB2
Date: 11-11-2019 - 11:43
"I'm sorry, but it is very unlikely that we are going to be putting high value air cargo onto intermodal trains, it's not economical Councilman...."...
"Now, if you can find industries, that use significant volumes of bulk commodities (chemicals, corn syrup, corn oil, sugar, grains, hops, etc.) , or have economies of scale for products (paper products, steel products that are more economically shipped by rail, then you should look at a rail served facility, Councilman...."
I've been a few times around the big circle (jerk?) of "build it and they will come" "Inland Ports" hype.... It is another favorite "flavor of the week" in political and planning circle, as a panacea for everything from the Councilman's worsening baldness, to the loss of your employment and tax base when the "air base" closed down... I personally have wasted your taxpayer time and money on such schemes, and thank you all very much for the paychecks...but, I had much better lists of your actual transportation "needs" that we weren't working on.
One of my favorites that a local transportation agency came up with, was that for some strange reason they were going to build a giant transload in Victorville.... And, dray stuff even further out in Sou Cal traffic to load it at yet another closed airbase with too much runway capacity and no excess supply of "users" since the Air Force left.... When that idea fell flat, we were going to load containers on "trains" at the port, take them to Victorville, and unload them there, and reload them again....? And, this "transload" was being done here...for no apparent good reason, that I could understand.... Now don't get me wrong, in the US some "inland" transload facilities are being and have been located, mostly mid nation, not many stop to resort and reload after going just 90 miles from the port...?
If I had a dime for every one of these "free trade zone"/"inland port" "schemes" I've heard over the last 30 years or so of my career.... I'd own Victorville.
Is there any potential subset of "real" potential rail users for this spur? As that is the real question no one seems to have answered?
"Now, if you can find industries, that use significant volumes of bulk commodities (chemicals, corn syrup, corn oil, sugar, grains, hops, etc.) , or have economies of scale for products (paper products, steel products that are more economically shipped by rail, then you should look at a rail served facility, Councilman...."
I've been a few times around the big circle (jerk?) of "build it and they will come" "Inland Ports" hype.... It is another favorite "flavor of the week" in political and planning circle, as a panacea for everything from the Councilman's worsening baldness, to the loss of your employment and tax base when the "air base" closed down... I personally have wasted your taxpayer time and money on such schemes, and thank you all very much for the paychecks...but, I had much better lists of your actual transportation "needs" that we weren't working on.
One of my favorites that a local transportation agency came up with, was that for some strange reason they were going to build a giant transload in Victorville.... And, dray stuff even further out in Sou Cal traffic to load it at yet another closed airbase with too much runway capacity and no excess supply of "users" since the Air Force left.... When that idea fell flat, we were going to load containers on "trains" at the port, take them to Victorville, and unload them there, and reload them again....? And, this "transload" was being done here...for no apparent good reason, that I could understand.... Now don't get me wrong, in the US some "inland" transload facilities are being and have been located, mostly mid nation, not many stop to resort and reload after going just 90 miles from the port...?
If I had a dime for every one of these "free trade zone"/"inland port" "schemes" I've heard over the last 30 years or so of my career.... I'd own Victorville.
Is there any potential subset of "real" potential rail users for this spur? As that is the real question no one seems to have answered?
