558 N. Main St., Prineville, OR 97754 | (541) 447-6205
For the third time in the past five years, the City of Prineville Railway will benefit from a multi-million-dollar Connect Oregon grant.
The City of Prineville learned Wednesday that they had been awarded another $2.12 million in Connect Oregon III funds. The grants are used to fund various transportation infrastructures across the state.
With their new freight depot mostly finished, thanks to the $5.5 million provided by the first two Connect Oregon grants, City of Prineville Railway will sink most of the recently-awarded money into another multi-phase project.
“We will start phase one of what we call the Prineville Junction Project,” said Railway Business Development Manager Dale Keller.
The junction is located just north of Redmond, where the Prineville railroad line joins the Oregon trunk line, the north-south railroad arterial in Oregon. The project will upgrade a junction that has been critical to the success of the railway over the years.
“At the freight depot, we handle lumber, building materials, multiple commodities - that’s stuff that travels in box cars, tanker cars, and lumber cars,” Keller explained. “The Prineville Junction is going to handle what we call bulk commodities, like aggregate or sand. We’re going to put in two 1,000-foot parallel tracks, a 1,750-foot storage track, and then the infrastructure necessary to handle those commodities.”
The Junction Project will likely involve two or three phases, Keller said.
Since 2005, the Connect Oregon grants have enabled City of Prineville Railway to upgrade and survive a financially lean time when its very existence has hung by a thread.
“I believe if we hadn’t initiated these projects the railroad would be gone,” Keller said.
Instead, the railway appears to be trending up. In fact, according to the latest City of Prineville financial report, the railway turned a small profit.
“As bad as the economy has been, we have been able to consistently move forward,” Keller said.
For Prineville City Manager Steve Forrester, the recent success of the railway is owed not only to the Connect Oregon grants, but region-wide support for railroad as a viable means of transportation.
“We have just had a lot of support for the railroad from ODOT (Oregon Department of Transportation),” Forrester said. “So, they see the value of the railroad as a source of transportation, not just for Prineville, but for the region. I think everyone in the region is convinced that rail has a future in Central Oregon.”
As far as the recent profit goes, Forrester is hopeful that a lean operational budget coupled with the upgrades to the railway will breed more success down the road.
“To be able to hold the line and be able to make some money is really a great first step,” he said. “I’m very optimistic.”
