Comment EI-19286
Received or sent (printed as 1/5/2013)
I love about 100 yards from the tracks in Missoula. Already due to increased coal exports I am feeling impacts. The diesel pollution has got much worse. There are two fueling stations and a locomotive maintenance area right in front of my house. Permitting the TRR would only worsen diesel pollution in the Missoula valley and my neighborhood. Alon with the diesel pollution there is noise pollution and I'm not talking about the train horns. The empty coal trains on their way back to the PRB have to do their maintenance checks, which involves coupling and switching empty coal cars. Noise levels of up to 119 decibels come from the railyard during coal car maintenance. They bang together so loud it sounds like bombs going off. Prior to permitting this rail line these issues need to be considered and investigated. The rail line doesn't end at Miles City, so folks further down the line should have a chance to attend a scoping hearing. It'd be nice to have one out this way. The environmental impact statement for the proposed Tongue River Railroad should analyze the following: Public convenience and necessity: This proposed railroad is not for the “public convenience and necessity” which is what is required in order for a body to get the power of eminent domain and condemnation authority. This railroad would serve only one coal company giant, Arch Coal, which intends to sell the coal to China and other Asian countries. Impacts on property values: The project would devalue property and infringes on property rights. This railroad will cause fires, spread weeds, devalue property (especially riverfront property), will make ranching and farming more difficult and expensive, will split ranch land in half and separate fields from the river and will shift the liability of train crossings to the landowner. Wildlife: The Tongue River Valley is rich in wildlife habitat and home to outstanding elk and mule deer populations as well as upland birds. Industrializing this valley with a railroad and the coal strip mine it serves will seriously degrade this excellent sportsman resource. Flooding: The railroad bed will act as an earthen dam and potentially worsen the flooding problems now experienced in Miles City in the winter with ice jams. Noise: The loud trains will ruin the quiet enjoyment of nearby recreation areas near Miles City. Infrastructure and traffic: Taxes will go up for residents communities along the rail lines as the coal heads to coastal ports for shipment. This railroad will increase coal train traffic substantially causing traffic delays, noise, and diesel pollution. The only way to live with this increased traffic will require expensive over passes and safety crossing which are paid for primarily by local taxpayers. The Tongue River Railroad will allow coal that should stay in the ground to be burned in dirty Chinese plants and will fuel intolerable, decades-long increases in Carbon Dioxide emissions. The greenhouse gas costs of Otter Creek coal go far beyond just burning the coal. It must be mined, hauled by trains fueled by diesel to West Coast terminals, shipped overseas by ships fueled by diesel, and then hauled in China to the plants.
Submitted by: Lowell Chandler · Blue Skies Campaign · Missoula, Montana
The Board publishes this comment in its environmental-comment table for this proceeding. It is quoted here as printed; nothing is inferred from it, and it states the commenter's own position in their own words, not this record's.
Permanent address docketyard.org/d/FD-30186/comment/EI-19286 · back to the docket sheet