Quiet zones in city take step:

A new company has been hired to shepherd the city through its application to establish a quiet zone for trains traveling through downtown Columbus.

The Columbus Redevelopment Commission agreed Monday to pay up to $41,721 to CTC of Fort Worth, Texas, for a two-step contract to help the city quiet the horns from trains passing through the city.

The first phase in an 18-month process would analyze the four rail crossings at State Road 46/State Road 11, and Fifth, Eighth and 11th street crossings and prepare paperwork for federal officials. The second phase would involve handling applications for physical improvements to the crossings, estimated costs and timelines.

Once the consulting work is done, overall cost to the city would potentially be $250,000 per railroad crossing, making the total cost to eliminate train horns in the downtown area at about $1 million, said Dave Hayward, executive director of public works and city engineer.

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Money has already been set aside by the Columbus Area Metropolitan Planning Organization to pay for the improvements, but the eventual actual cost to upgrade all four crossings to the railroad’s specifications is yet to be determined, Hayward said. The city has not yet committed to do the improvements, only to hire CTC to determine how to proceed and what the cost will be.

When commission members questioned whether the project would actually eliminate all train horns in the four-crossing stretch through downtown, Hayward said that is the intent.

Since the horns are a safety mechanism designed to warn motorists that a train is approaching, the railroad will require safeguards such as enhanced gates and medians that would prevent vehicles from going around the gates, he said. He described what the railroad would require at each crossing in exchange for not using their train horns as “safety devices on steroids.”

Last month, commission members questioned CTC’s experience in the field and wanted to know what other cities the company has worked with on quiet zones.

Redevelopment director Heather Pope said the city had talked with Palestine, Texas, and Rock Hill, South Carolina, and representatives in each city said they were satisfied with the company’s work to help them create quiet zones. CTC is currently working with four cities, Fort Worth and Bryan, Texas; Edmond, Oklahoma; and Greeley, Colorado, along with the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District on creating quiet zones, Pope said.

This will be the first quiet zone request that has been made for the Louisville & Indiana Railroad, whose tracks go through Columbus, she said. Louisville & Indiana representatives have recommended CTC to the city as a company with expertise.

The quiet zone project is in response to a U.S. Department of Transportation Surface Transportation Board decision in April 2014 to approve a request by CSX Railroad for joint use of the Louisville & Indiana Railroad rail corridor between Louisville, Kentucky and Indianapolis.

The city is preparing for longer, faster and heavier CSX trains to begin hauling freight northbound on the L&I tracks beginning in the third or fourth quarter of this year, city officials said.

A study commissioned by the city indicated it will have as many as 22 trains a day traveling through the State Road 46 intersection compared to eight now, and the trains’ length will be longer — from 5,100 feet now to 7,500 feet in the future.

The city had been working with retired railroad president John K. Secor, of Secor Consulting LLC in Louisville, Kentucky, on the project, but he has agreed to withdraw and let CTC take over the process, Hayward said.

Quiet zones are one of the interim solutions city officials have mentioned in response to upcoming rail volume increases.

During public comment about the proposal, local resident Charles Doup asked the commission to reconsider spending that kind of money when the trains will continue to blow horns outside the quiet zone, contending there would be no real benefit. Doup said train horns in rural areas of the county are audible in Columbus.

When commission members asked who specifically wanted the quiet zones, Pope and Hayward mentioned Hotel Indigo, which is near the railroad tracks, and Cummins, Inc., which has its global headquarters downtown.

“Every business downtown has to live with this. It’s a quality-of-life issue,” commission member Al Roszcyzk said of the train horns. “When you think about the thousands of people affected by this every day, it’s a big issue.”

Mary Ferdon, executive director of administration and community development, said at times city employees have to stop conversations in City Hall when trains go by with horns blaring. And when 20 trains a day go by, outdoor events, city tours and customers visiting downtown business will all be affected, she said.

Mentioning that Cummins has a major renovation underway for its headquarters, Ferdon said train horns are disruptive to all downtown businesses.

Commission member George Dutro commented that if the city doesn’t get the quiet zone now, five years from now the city might be wishing it had.

“This is a piece we need to get into place,” Ferdon said of the CTC contract. “We’re trying to find a solution with a minimal cost.”

The four crossings being considered for the quiet zone are among Columbus’ 18 public and seven private active crossings, city officials said.