Comment EI-1799
Received or sent (printed as 12/9/2005)
I attended the meeting on Dec 6th at North Pole to discuss the new railroad from Fairbanks to Delta Junction. As someone who will be directly impacted by one of the proposed routes I have been forced to try to figure out this process. Please let me know if I am correct in the following assumptions. You are currently getting public input into the 3 proposed routes. That will end first of January, all modifications of these routes will be done, and the environmental impact study will be started on each specific route. Environmental impact study could take 2 years. Once done the pros and cons of each route will be evaluated and then a final route chosen. If I am correct that means we may be looking at 2 years when we have a line drawn through our property. Thank goodness we are not trying to sell our land. I can’t imagine anyone would want to move here with the possibility of a railroad running through their yard. Is there still time for a separate route to be identified? As a member of the Eielson Farm Community we are advocating going immediately across the river and then second choice follow the highway and not cross private farm land. I have not heard a real reason for why these two routes are not acceptable. I hear that across the river the land is too bad to build on and yet no test sites have been drilled on this upper portion so no one knows for sure what the cost would be to build in the location that would not impact any private landowners. If you are only looking to make minor modifications to existing routes I think I should let you know my specific concerns even though I really prefer the above route changes. I live at 4800 Eielson Farm Road. The route N3 goes directly behind our house and crosses our property. As owners of farm land we are prohibited from selling land less than 40 acres. It is my belief that if the railroad crosses our land they need to purchase two 40 acre parcels which include our house which was just built 2 years ago at the cost of $600,000+, a hay field and an active field used to grow barley. Plans to clear more land are being reconsidered because of this project. In looking at the map I’m thinking just by angling the railroad a little more towards the highway and putting in a couple more culverts over pile driver slough you could miss our property completely. Hopefully you would go on the other side of the slough and not impact our home with noise and potential danger to our pets. I appreciated the effort it took to get so many people together to answer questions at the meeting on the 6th. However I think you are over estimating the general publics understanding of this process and that such a setting was intimidating to people who are really concerned yet don’t want to feel silly asking questions. Please consider doing more of a presentation and introductions to those attending. Maybe every hour someone could introduce who is there and what part they play in the process. I support the building of the railroad and can live with whatever decision is made as long as it makes sense to me. So far the routes chosen do not make sense when there is so much public land around us. I spoke with the Eielson representative at the meeting and he did not know of a reason why they would refuse to allow the railroad to run along the highway. Thank you for your attention, Robyn Davies PO Box 55266 North Pole, AK 99705 davrobyn@hotmail.com 907-490-6485
Submitted by: Robyn Davies · North Pole, AK
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-34658/comment/EI-1799
File docketyard.org/document/5e52e079daecdb8a250b0aeedef22cf179a654034dcc32b476cdef35047ec112.pdf · back to the docket sheet