Loading ...A consultant’s report on removing some truck traffic from Interstate 81 bears good news. The report’s chief finding is that a plan to move freight traffic off the highway and onto train tracks could shift about 13.5 percent of trucks off the crowded interstate highway.
The December report released recently recommended that Virginia stick to its present plan to address truck congestion on I-81 by continuing its funding of the Crescent Corridor. That is a proposed new intermodal rail service under which Norfolk Southern Corp. intends to expand its rail system to better compete with, and integrate with, highway trucking.
The corridor is designed to connect the southern freight hubs of New Orleans and Memphis, Tenn., with those in New Jersey by way of western and central Virginia.
Cambridge Systematics prepared the report, which took note that Virginia has pledged $95 million to construction of parts of the Virginia leg of the corridor as the state’s strategy to relieve heavy truck traffic on I-81.
Read the full article from the News & Advance, published February 17, 2010: www2.newsadvance.com/lna/news/opinion/editorials/article/rail_freight_could_lessen_i-81_gridlock/24168/.
