Revitalizing a Railroad

Short lines like Watco’s South Kansas & Oklahoma Railroad (SKOL) provide first- and final-mile rail service to businesses across the U.S. They’re a vital connection to the rest of North America and beyond for small and large customers alike, especially in rural communities. It takes a lot to keep these lines running safely, and sometimes they need support too.

Federal Railroad Administration Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and Safety Improvement (CRISI) grants provide critical support to modernize short lines and attract new customers. The SKOL received a $27 million grant in 2020. After further contributions from the Kansas and Oklahoma departments of transportation and Watco, the infrastructure investment totaled around $42 million.

What does this investment mean and what are the benefits?

It’s a major upgrade for a railroad that carries grain, aggregates, fertilizer, cement, petroleum products, metals, and much more. Since beginning work in June 2022, the SKOL and contractors have:

• Replaced 150,000 ties

• Laid 60,000 tons of ballast

• Upgraded 12 switches on the Tulsa Sub

• Improved 66 crossings

• Installed 34 miles of new, heavier rail

• Repaired or completely rebuilt 27 bridges

• Completed 200 miles of surfacing

These upgrades mean safer, smoother crossings in our communities. The new rail allows customers to move 286,000-pound railcars at 25 mph, increasing efficiency and decreasing costs. And the improved switches and infrastructure help ensure our customers are served efficiently and railcars reach their destinations safely.

“Many of our customers and Class I partners want to move higher-capacity railcars and want quicker transit times,” said Casey Harbour, Watco sales manager. “This allows the SKOL to do that, and the investments into safety ensure we’re not putting the communities where we operate at any risk in the process.”

The project is a public-private partnership success story. Government agencies, shippers, contractors, and Watco worked together to revitalize rural rail in southeast Kansas and northeast Oklahoma, spurring industrial growth and job creation.

And we’re already seeing the effects. The modernized and more efficient SKOL helped secure a transformational $350 million investment into Montgomery County, Kansas: a soybean processing facility, scheduled to come online in mid-2024. Its construction has supported hundreds of jobs and will create many more. Several existing customers have expanded rail shipments or are planning to do so.

There’s more to come

There’s still work to be done to modernize service for the new soybean facility and other customers on the SKOL. To help complete the upgrades, the railroad recently received another grant for a project totaling $39 million.

“The CRISI that we just received is big for the soybean facility,” said Harbour. “The initial grant did not address the main subdivisions that the new traffic will traverse. When both are completed, every customer on the SKOL will reap the benefits of the upgrades.”