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Railroad Forums
Moderators: sery2831, CRail
atlantis wrote:When the portion of the Falmouth line from the renovated Falmouth depot to North Falmouth was removed, there was a previous rail with trail plan until then state rep. Eric Turkington and his compatriots were able to convince the state to go for the trail only despite the fact that over two million dollars was spent to renovate Falmouth station including a (then) new platform constructed in 1990 that never saw a train. Also, at the time, the then-embryonic Cape Cod Central railroad had a plan to repair the line at its own expense for trips to Falmouth. Granted the Falmouth branch was out of service at its lower portion, and for whatever reason, the pro rail people failed to speak up, as many of them said privately that they were hoping the trains would return.Adirondack Scenic is not a valid comparison. ADIX is a non- common carrier tourist railroad (and an all-volunteer one at that) run over tracks that have already been designated a multi-use corridor prior to the carrier beginning operations. Cape Rail is a very much for-profit company consisting of two separate reporting marks--one a freight common carrier with a Class I interchange--with incumbent trackage rights on the Falmouth Branch; there's a binding state-level trash train freight contract governing the use/re-use of Falmouth Transfer Station; the U.S. Military access/prioritization to Otis pre-dates any state involvement in the branch; and there has never been an interruption in active status to North Falmouth/Otis. That's a night-and-day difference in strength of federal preemptions. ADIX is in a precarious position because too much of that fed caselaw is inapplicable to their situation. Indeed, the fight over the legality of the rip-'em-out-and-trail plan is being waged almost entirely at the state level because ADIX can't get any meaningful STB help to bat away the attack on their existence with a mere adverse discontinuance order. The state is the incumbent, not the RR or related businesses, on the "multi-use"-designation section of ROW in dispute so ADIX is playing an unusually weak hand not having many many legal preemption tools at its disposal. That's why it's so high-profile a case; the carrier's hand is so unusually weak it's a perfect storm situation where even trail lobby -caliber midrange fundraising levels could actually land a killshot there...where it wouldn't in any other situation. ADIX has basically got to prove in a civil action that that trail sleaze is a taxpayer scam. That's quite different from seeking affirmation of preemption caselaw.
A similar battle is going on at the Adirondack Scenic railroad where a group of trail-only people are trying to pressure New York state to remove the tracks at Lake Placid, even though portions of the line are active and volunteers are trying to repair the portion of line at Lake Placid for excursion service. My point being that removal or trying to remove an active rail line for a recreational trail sets a dangerous precedent for the rest of the country. In my opinion, it was bad enough that the state removed the Falmouth line from North Falmouth to Falmouth center. We need to ensure that the remaining rail infrastructure on the Cape is not removed, or at least made out of the question to remove, lest anyone tries to gat the state to remove the active portions of the lines.