Local & Regional Agencies

RII has extensive experience working closely with local communities and agencies and their special concerns, including rural areas. Communities are interested in how projects will affect their own residents, whether that is measuring economic growth, negative impacts of a project or assisting with navigation of complex federal laws and procedures. These smaller projects deserve the same quality as state level projects and RII is able to focus tasks where they will have the most impact to fit local budgets.

+Flexible with task proposing to zero in on exactly what the client needs +Able to work with multiple stakeholders and their different expectations, including board members, councils, public, local businesses and railroads +Able to bring together community needs with state, federal and railroad requirements +Ongoing advisory assistance available for working out issues as they come up +Complete stand alone studies or piece by piece analysis and support of your internal personnel as needed +Measure the positive or negative impacts of a project, including but not limits to safety, environmental, economic and quality of life For additional projects on Economic Development, please see our Economic Development page

Projects

Perry County Port Authority in Indiana
This groundbreaking 6 year project was the forerunner for many of RII’s subsequent industrial and economic development projects. The project began with an economic analysis of a rail line that was threatened with abandonment and resulted in the opening of the port and development of a multimodal logistics park including rail, roadways, and river barge transportation. The complete project from the feasibility planning stage through implementation included rail assets inspections, maintenance and upgrade costing, detailed shipper interviews covering all commodities, modal and flow analyses, financial and economic analyses for the best ownership and operational scenario, and in depth negotiations with the serving carriers. Gary V. Hunter served as the interim manager for the facility, including hiring all personnel and running operations until the Executive Director was hired.
Coos-Siskiyou Shipper Coalition in Oregon & California
This coalition was formed of local shippers, cities and other county officials in Southern Oregon and northern California when the serving rail carrier, Central Oregon and Pacific (CORP), reduced railroad service that affected these areas and threatened abandonment. RII did a complete economic analysis, including inspections of the branch line to be closed, interviews with all customers on their traffic and service needed, compared and quantified the impact to their transportation costs and capacities, and assisted the coalition with a filing with the STB. The filing claimed that the service on their line could be operated profitably and proposed requiring a third party operator if CORP refused to operate at the needed service levels. RII performed the operational analysis to show what traffic levels would be, what all costs should be, the profit margins would be and cash flow, including complete pro forma financial statements for the projected operations. The filing became an official Offer of Financial Assistance for which the STB forced sale of the branch line to the Port of Coos Bay, part of the coalition. RII also assisted with development of a formal Request for Proposals for a qualified short line operator and ensured it was distributed to the qualified operators known through its experience.
City of Shafter, California
RII assisted this municipality to navigate the regulations and communicate with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) and California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) regarding installing a rail crossing within the community that would greatly improve access and mobility within the community, thereby also improving economic development a growth prospects. RII reviewed detailed specifications, requirements from both CPUC and FRA for safety and traffic control based on the traffic estimated at the crossing and facilitated meetings between the agencies and city.
Kiowa County, Colorado
RII developed a Net Liquidation Value for this county for the Towner Rail Line. The railroad had been purchased from the state by a rail holding company 7 years prior under a requirement that it maintain the line in the same condition and continue the same level of service for at least 7 years. Upon the 7 year end of the term, the current owner began preparation to cease service and abandon the line. Kiowa County, along with nearby counties and shippers, formed a coalition to save their rail service. RII's valuation was used in filings to force the buyback and restoral of the line. The Towner Line still operates today, now under contract to Watco Companies.
Lewiston and Auburn, Maine
These two cities jointly own a short piece of railroad called Lewiston Auburn Railroad Company. RII has assisted these municipalities to acquire new property, analyze likely rail traffic and flows for the rail facilities and evaluate several rail properties. These analyses have included inspections, appraisals and traffic analysis to advise on economic development potential, asset redistribution between the two cities, each with different interests regarding the rail assets, as well as establishing new service and traffic for the facilities.