The USDOT has just announced the winners of the Tiger II Discretionary Grant program; and four projects in Oregon and SW Washington will receive funding.
The USDOT has just announced the winners of the Tiger II Discretionary Grant program; and the following projects in Oregon and SW Washington will receive funding:
* A project to rehabilitate the Coos Bay Rail Link, which closed in 2007 due to lack of maintenance (and an attempted shakedown of the state by CORP, the shortline that operates the tracks); $13.5 million
* A project to alleviate rail traffic congestion at the Port of Vancouver, $10 million
* A project to add 42 fast charging stations along the I-5 corridor to support electric cars, $2 million.
* A study project to study the building of liveable communities in the Aloha/Reedville area, $1.5 million. (Say hello to Harvey while you’re there!)
Not much for transit this time around; but the freight rail projects are particularly welcome. For more detail, see here and here.
4 responses to “Tiger II grant winners in Oregon and SW Washington.”
Great news for Oregon’s [currently economically unsustainable] southern coast!
Too bad the Port of Tillamook decided to use their emergency fed funds to maximize on trucking instead of saving their rail spur like Coos Bay just did. Oh well, the Port had its reasons…
Scotty-
Having poked around in the details of a prior iteration of the Aloha/Reedville project, I’d actually put an asterisk on your statement that there’s “not much for transit here.”
Many of the challenges this area faces have to do w/ deteriorating mid-20thC auto-oriented development, and the profoundly hostile pedestrian environment created by TV Hwy. How to best improve transit service in the corridor will be a big part of any solution.
Improving on the service provided by the 57, and thinking about possible future high-capacity transit alternatives, is no small potatoes for transit, given the ridership of this line!
Great news for Oregon’s [currently economically unsustainable] southern coast!
Amen to that.
Too bad the Port of Tillamook decided to use their emergency fed funds to maximize on trucking instead of saving their rail spur like Coos Bay just did. Oh well, the Port had its reasons…
Considering the PoT rail line was washed out twice by storms in an 11-year period, it probably wasn’t considered worth the effort/expense to rebuild, which is a pity. I remember reading about an intriguing proposal to transport rail cars by barge up to Astoria, and then transfer them to the freight tracks there; can’t think of any reason off the top of my head why this wouldn’t be workable.
As for the currently defunct PoT line, if nothing else, it would make for a heckuva recreational trail between the Metro area and the coast.
A few other relevant differences between Coos Bay and Tillamook.
Coos Bay has a deepwater port which does quite a bit of business in commodity shipment, which depends on a rail connection to the rest of the national freight network.
Tillamook has no deepwater harbor. Much of Tillamook industry is in agricultural and food products, many of which are perishable and thus better shipped by truck. Even when the PoTR line was in operation, trains were relatively infrequent.
Economically, there’s little doubt that the Coos Bay line is more important to the state’s economy than the PoTR line