FLOWERY BRANCH – The Flowery Branch City Council is caught in a squeeze. There apparently is no simple or perfect answer to a problem over which city leaders probably have little control.
The problem facing the city involves the set of railroad tracks that runs through the downtown area, paralleling State Route 13, Atlanta Highway. The tracks and the right-of-way they sit on are owned by Norfolk Southern Railroad.
Those tracks have a long history, back to a time when Flowery Branch was a small, sleepy dot on the map. Over the decades the relationship between the railroad and the city has been very amiable.
In 1972 the railroad sold the historic train depot to the city for one dollar. It was rehabilitated, as was an old caboose, and today those two artifacts of a time long ago serve as the visual mascots of the south Hall County community.
At three locations within city limits vehicles are able to cross the twin tracks: Lights Ferry Road, Spring Street and Chattahoochee Street.
The reason there are two sets of railroad tracks is because it allows trains headed in opposite directions to pass one another along the two-and-a-half miles between Harbor Bay Marina and the King’s Hawaiian plant; above and below those two places there is only one set of tracks.
The procedure is simple: one train transitions over to the second set of tracks and waits as the other train passes by. Once everything is clear the first train returns to the main line and continues its journey; simple enough, until recently.
As the population of Flowery Branch has grown dramatically, and as the city works to attract people to its downtown area, the number of vehicles needing to use the city’s trio of crossing locations has sky rocketed.
And, making matters more complex, the length of the freight trains that use the second set of tracks has increased. Some trains, said to be as long as 8,000-feet or1.5-miles in length, are long enough to block all three crossing points into the city while they wait for the approaching, opposing train to pass. And that creates a traffic nightmare.
City Manager Bill Andrew told council members that the railroad engineers are actually trying to mitigate that problem by stopping in a place that allows two of the three crossings to remain clear, blocking only the crossing at Chattahoochee Street.
Andrew explained that in doing that the engineers are actually violating company policy by stopping short of the official light which sits further down the track. “If the engineer begins doing what he’s really supposed to be doing…if he’s actually going to follow policy and go to that signal he’s going to be blocking all three crossings we have in town.”
Andrew said Norfolk Southern has offered to move the stop signal so the engineers can be in compliance with railroad policy and not block all three crossings, and to pay for the relocation, but they want the city to stop using the Chattahoochee Street crossing in exchange.
“What they’re saying is if they’re going to spend $170,000 on this project…then we’re going to need a closing,” Andrew explained. “What I understood from them is they are not going to spend the $170,000…without getting something in return, which is the closure of one of our crossings.”
With that situation before them city leaders were proposing that the Chattahoochee Street crossing be closed. That resolution was on Thursday night’s agenda; that resolution brought strong opposition from several community members.
Area resident Mack Jones said, “There’s no need to redevelop downtown if there’s no way to get to it.”
One resident said to make it illegal for the trains to stop, to which Andrew responded, “If AMTRAK is coming, or the other train is coming, where is he to go? There’s a space-time issue here. There’s two trains and there’s one track, and at some point they got to get out of the way!”
Flowery Branch resident Walt Stiving told council members he was very much against closing the crossing and that the railroad should be held liable for blocking any crossing. “Council should look at some sort of resolution to fine them when they do block the roads and the crossings.”
City Attorney Ron Bennett said in his opinion that would probably not work as the courts are divided on whether municipalities can cite railroad utilities. “The way the railroad approaches that throughout the nation is that they challenge the citations, they don’t pay them claiming that federal law preempts the state law…and the state cannot interfere with the free movement of interstate commerce.”
And, it was suggested, getting into a squabble with the railroad might provoke them into taking matters into their own hands regarding the closure of that crossing.
Mayor Mike Miller said, “They could legally go out there tomorrow and close the crossing.”
Attorney Bennett agreed with Mayor Miller. “Technically this crossing is completely within the railroad right-of-way.”
Andrew said that sort of situation (Norfolk Southern preemptively taking action) happened in our area in 2014. “That’s what they did with the county on Tumbling Creek. They (Norfolk Southern) were offering some assistance financially to have all that done and the county said ‘No, we don’t want to do it.’ So they withdrew the assistance and closed it anyway.”
Andrew said the railroad indicated that they would like to pay for the signal to be moved, and have the crossing closed, by the end of 2018. Andrew said after January 1 the funding might not be available.
With so many variables at work and with so many Flowery Branch residents still having questions about the decision making process, the council voted to postpone the resolution and host a pair of informational meetings so all interested parties can learn and discuss the matter.
The date for the morning and evening meetings will be announced soon.
PTVs PASS FIRST HURDLE
First reading for an ordinance regulating the use of Personal Transportation Vehicles (PTV) was approved unanimously.
Second reading and a final vote is scheduled for the next city council meeting, October 18th.
