Northeast Texas Rural Rail Transportation District Board members approved a $67,000 expenditure to pay for repairs to one bridge, located west of Weaver in Hopkins County, that has enough damage to make it unusable.
Discussion over the expenditure began at the NETEX regular board meeting Thursday, May 2. The NETEX Board was unable to come to a consensus at that meeting, so a special meeting was called Monday, May 6 to further discuss the issue.
The NETEX rail district consists of 65 miles of trackage, with more than 70 bridge structures and stretches from Mount Pleasant to Wylie.
“In November 2023, Federal Railroad Administration did an inspection. As a result, the rating for the track from Sulphur Springs to Greenville was downgraded from Class I to ‘accepted’ track,” Mike Salek, managing principal for Freedom Rail Group which is over NETEX rail operator Northeast Texas Connector, told the NETEX Board.
A $375,000 bridge rehab project was undertaken to get the tracks “back up to speed.”
Between late December 2023 and early January 2024, the FRA informed Salek that they would perform the inspection, but NETEX’s track had to be essentially perfect.
“Typically, when a defect is found, in either bridge or track, you have a 30-day clock to fix it,” Salek said. “When FRA comes out and finds a defect, they want to know if you’ve discovered it, if you know about it. And, if you haven’t, they start that 30-day clock.”
Essentially, this means that NETEX would be shut down without being allowed the typical 30-day window to make repairs. A shutdown would be immediate.
Salek said at that point, all spending for repairs stopped, because the risk of FRA finding additional issues was too great.
“There’s one bridge we are protecting between the Canadian Pacific Kansas City railway and the trainload. FRA didn’t find anything wrong with it. It’s at Class 1 standard. We can keep it that way, and that’s not part of the re-inspection,” Salek said.
The bridge is located west of Weaver, in Hopkins County.
“Hopkins County bridges are good,” Salek noted of the other bridges along the NETEX rail in Hopkins County.
Following Monday’s meeting, Salek was to contact the company who will do the repairs to see how soon they can be scheduled.