Indiana Department of Transportation officials are taking a second archeological look at Columbus’ proposed railroad overpass project after an initial dig led to questions and the need for more investigation.
Completing an environmental study, including an archeological study of the proposed overpass area near the State Road 46/State Road 11 railroad crossing, is required by the federal government, mandatory for all proposed state road projects, said Harry Maginity, INDOT spokesman.
Some trenches were dug as part of the initial archeological investigation last winter, which led to officials deciding they needed to take a deeper look into one section of ground that is part of the project, Maginity said.
During the initial sampling last winter, Maginity said workers found sandy alluvial soil in part of the project area that was deeper than the 24 inches in the trench, leading them to want to investigate further.
“This is the type of soil that can have artifacts,” Maginity said.
However, the presence of alluvial soil, which is a fine-grained fertile soil deposited by water flowing over flood plains or in river beds, doesn’t always contain artifacts, he said. It’s simply an indicator that the area could have them.
Columbus Redevelopment Commission member George Dutro mentioned Monday during a commission meeting that INDOT had raised some environmental concerns from what it found in the trenches — joking that perhaps they found a mastodon skeleton.
The area in question, near the banks of the East Fork White River near Mill Race Park, is in the vicinity of a former city landfill.
Redevelopment commission members speculated that the trenches may have revealed shards of unknown materials from the long-closed landfill.
“That’s just a guess,” Dutro said.
Maginity said the additional digging around the area should not put any extra pressure on the timeline for the railroad overpass, which is now in INDOT’s hands as the project continues toward a fall 2019 construction start. He described it as a necessary procedural step before the project can continue.
Columbus and INDOT are building the overpass over the State Road 46/State Road 11 train crossing in response to a plan by CSX Railroad, in partnership with the Louisville & Indiana Railroad, to send longer, faster and heavier CSX trains through Columbus beginning this fall.
A study commissioned by the city indicates as many as 22 trains may travel through the State Road 46/State Road 11 intersection, and other downtown intersections, when a railroad bridge over the Flat Rock River is completed this year. The century-old rail bridge needs to be widened for today’s rail traffic and re-engineered to carry double-stacked rail cars the railroad plans to use.
The northbound longer, faster and heavier CSX trains are expected to increase the current wait time at the State Road 46 crossing to about 20 minutes this year — and grow to 40-minute delays by 2036. Those times reflect what will happen if nothing is done to change the rail crossing configuration, consultants from Indianapolis engineering firm American Structurepoint Inc. said.
Last year, Columbus approved the creation of a non-reverting fund to pay for the overpass, allowing the city to keep track of money toward the project at the State Road 46/State Road 11 intersection. The state has agreed to pick up $15 million, half of the project’s overall cost, while the city’s portion will come from different private and public sources of funding.
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For more information about the Railroad Overpass Project, visit https://columbusrailroadproject.org/.
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