Comment EI-25017
Received or sent (printed as 7/15/2016)
Dear Dave Navecky, As a farmer in Winnebago County, I have major concerns about how farmland is affected. The proposed route will create many severed fields of irregular, non-square or rectangular shapes full of point rows. Any time the rail line moves through a crop field at an angle, it creates economic hardships due to the fact that modern farm machinery is designed to efficiently operate in rectangular or square fields. Anything other than a 90 degree corner is termed a point row. This wastes fuel, uses extra seed, and causes overlaps of pesticides & fertilizers. This last concern creates environmental damage that impacts us all. In an example where a field is 1⁄2 mile wide, there are typically 44 passes into the headlands per side of the railroad. A commonly used 24 row planter wastes 1.450 seeds per pass over the field. A bag of seed corn commonly costs over $300 per bag, containing approximately 80,000 seeds. Working new point rows created by the Great Lakes Basin Railroad would waste about 127,600 seeds or more than one and one-half seed bags, costing that farmer more than $450 in just one field. The over application of fertilizers and pesticides resulting from point rows not only significantly increases a farmer’s cost, but also creates environmental hazards and direct consequences. But this is not all, the wasted seeds (from double-planted rows) reduce yield because those pants cannot grow to their full potential. Point rows mean a farmer harvests less crop and earns less money. Point rows are created by any and all angles that are not 90 degrees. To minimize affects on farmers fields, great care should be taken to find routes that will cause minimal disturbances to farmers and land owners. For this task, I believe any proposed route for the railroad should run parallel to existing roads and section lines in order to not create severed parcels demonstrated above will have more economic impact to the local farmers then just the loss of the farmland consumed by the railroad. Natural boundaries that minimize impact to farmers like running parallel to major US interstates and highways could be one way to accomplish this task. For examples, the railroad running parallel to US interstate 90 from Wisconsin into Illinois could be one route the railroad could take. I also question if the environmental impacts of the proposed rail route extension from the Rockford airport over the Rock River through Ogle County, finally connecting to a Canadian National Railroad Subsidiary in Winnebago County in Winnebago Township can justify any economic benefits of that spur. There is a flyover where the Great Lakes Basin Railroad crosses that Canadian National Line in Boone County, so that effectively eliminates using the Great Lakes Basin spur into Winnebago County as safety benefit effort to community by by passing a larger metropolitan area from collisions with train traffic or by passing materials deemed to be hazardous from a densely populated area. Canadian National if they even agree to the use the line have to continue to use the line to move materials through the city of Rockford for destinations towards Chicago. I suggest that no proposed extension of the line towards Western Winnebago county even be considered if the Great Lakes Basin project does have a guarantee of use from the Canadian National Railroad company. I also ask that your organization carefully scrutinize this whole project and not grant any exemptions from Full Environmental Impact or any other full reviews for this project, because a project of this scope needs to be vetted seriously tome fullest extent. Sincerely, Brent Pollard
Submitted by: Brent Pollard · Rockford, IL
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-35952/comment/EI-25017 · back to the docket sheet