As a currently laid off POTB railroad employee you can probably guess my opinion on this subject.

I'd like to give you a few more things to consider. The railroad has provided competition for the trucks. How long do suppose it will take the truckers to raise their rates if the final decision to close the rail line is made? At what point will the mills no longer be competitive and shut down? This will remove the majority of the living wage jobs in the county. How much lost tax revenue will that be?

As another note what happens to all the track if the RR is shut down? The state will have to remove it. You can't get it out of the canyon by truck. To get it out by rail you have to fix the tracks. The way I see it's going to cost the state more to shut down the line than to fix it. Should we just shut the line down and spend the $26 Million removing the line with no chance of recovering the money, or should we spend the money and keep the tax revenue coming back into the state?

Aaron Zorko