Rail freight company CSX Transportation (CSXT) has announced that it will significantly upgrade facilities in Erwin Tennessee, the company moving forward to enable improvements to the delivery of various commodities.

As the former headquarters of the company’s predecessor Clinchfield Railroad, Erwin Tennessee retains its importance to CSXT as an important gateway for coal trains operating from the Appalachian’s to receivers such as electrical power utilities.

CSXT reports that the expansion project will focus on improving bulk services including coal and grain.  Approximately $6 million in track and structure work will take place at the Erwin terminal during 2008, the end goal of the work being to accommodate a growing volume of coal and some grain trains that will be using distributed power at the rear of those trains.

A further $3 million will be spent on communications and technology upgrades in the region to support distributed power.  Distributed power referring to locomotives placed in the middle or rear of a train and controlled by an engineer from the lead locomotive. CSXT states that by distributing the power through the train, handling over mountainous territory is improved, more rail cars can be added, and fuel efficiency is increased.

To accommodate the larger “distributed” trains, CSXT will also upgrade Erwin’s locomotive servicing facility as well as place an additional eight employees to Erwin to support the distributed power program.

CSXT Vice President for the Southern Region, Mike Pendergrass spoke eagerly of the upgrades, saying that “We look forward to these facility improvements to support distributed power, which in turn will provide more efficient service to our customers.”  Pendergrass also added that “We are proud of the long and consistent record of safety and service provided by our Erwin terminal and its employees.”

Demolition of some of the present facilities at Erwin will take place later this month to make way for upgrades such as extended yard tracks and a new car inspector facility.  Several power switches will also be installed in the terminal to enable trains to move through the yard more fluidly without requiring workers to manually manipulate them.

Based in Florida, CSXT provides rail, intermodal and rail-to-truck services over some 21,000 miles of rail network with service to 23 eastern states and the District of Columbia.

Source: CSX Corporation

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