By Floyd McKay for Crosscut.com
Mayors and city officials are scrambling to find ways to deal with an onslaught of new freight-rail traffic in Washington, with new projects seemingly coming online daily. Some of their frustrations are finding voice in public meetings to determine the scope of environmental review of the proposed Gateway Pacific Terminal at Cherry Point north of Bellingham.
That project would add 18 unit trains a day to traffic in the region, which is already at or near capacity in some sections, particularly the area from Everett to the Canadian border. At least 15 trains a day are in that section now, capacity for some choke points; Gateway Pacific Terminal would more than double that traffic when it reaches full operation later in the decade.
Regional rail traffic is facing severe stress as regional refineries look to the huge Bakken oil fields in North Dakota to feed their plants. Alaskan crude, the major source for the refineries, is past its peak and the Bakken fields are yet to be fully developed. Alaskan crude is carried in large ocean tankers; Bakken oil arrives via unit trains on the BNSF railway’s tracks.
Tesoro’s refinery at Anacortes has opened an addition that will add two trains a day — one full, the other returning — to haul Bakken oil. The BP refinery at Cherry Point has announced it will begin accepting Bakken oil as soon as 2014, adding about two trains a day (full and returning) when the facility reaches capacity. (A caution to those following stories of unit trainsÑalways check the figures to see if they include empty return trains as well as full trains; the difference is 100 percent.
(To read the full story, go to crosscut.com/coal-train-impacts-feared-along-sound)
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