BNSF request to close road at crossing in Whatcom questioned

BNSF railroad wants to close a Custer-area road so it can move trains to a siding off the main track as needed, but residents and county officials are questioning the railroad’s explanation of why it’s needed.

More than a dozen Whatcom County residents spoke out against the BNSF proposal to close Valley View Road at the crossing at a public hearing with state regulators from the Utilities and Transportation Commission Tuesday, Dec. 1.

Some were neighbors who live near the crossing, such as Reed Gillig, who said that despite frequently getting stuck at the crossings at times while trains are switched, that is still a better option than permanently closing the road, forcing people to take alternate routes.

“Often if one (crossing) is closed, boy, if you’re in a hurry you zip around and go to the other one, and now one of those is due to be closed,” Gillig said. “What was a minor impact is now a major impact.”

Gillig and other speakers also were concerned about the larger potential impacts of the project, questioning how it connects with oil train unloading facilities at two Cherry Point refineries and why BNSF has provided conflicting information during the process.

Project proposal

The stretch of railroad that crosses Valley View Road just south of Portal Way is part of what's known as the Custer spur — rail that extends off the mainline between Bellingham and Canada to serve industrial customers at Cherry Point.

BNSF has stated the road closure will be necessary for safety and so trains may be parked there, in part to make room for higher-priority trains on the mainline, such as Amtrak passenger trains.

The railroad’s application states the closure is necessary so existing customers can “receive and depart full length trains without blocking the main line, switches or roads. The intended use of the proposed siding extension would otherwise block the crossing for prolonged periods of time.”

But that reasoning raised a lot of questions for people at the hearing.

BNSF is also working to expand the tracks along the mainline from Ferndale to Custer to have enough siding to allow lower-priority trains such as coal trains to pull over for higher-priority hauls.

“One thing that strikes me about this is it’s a proposal to do a project that is going to serve existing businesses,” Gillig said, “but everything about it smells of expansion.”

The double track work near Ferndale is a project that will help accommodate future growth, while the siding is needed for business that BNSF has now, and will help prevent blocking the mainline, BNSF spokeswoman Courtney Wallace wrote in an email to The Bellingham Herald.

Not a request

BP Cherry Point and Phillips 66 refineries both have received permits from Whatcom County to build and operate oil-by-rail facilities without undergoing in-depth environmental review under the State Environmental Protection Act.

BP got its first shipment on Dec. 26, 2013, and is permitted to get an average of one train loaded with around 100 tank cars of crude oil per day; Phillips 66 received its first train Nov. 17, 2014, and is permitted to get an average of one train every other day.

If the facilities exceed those levels, they would have to submit to additional environmental review by Whatcom County.

Spokesmen for BP and Phillips 66 both said their companies had not requested the additional track space.

“We certainly support any safety investment, but it was not something that we requested,” said Mike Abendhoff, a BP spokesman. “We certainly have the capability in our facility to take unit trains already.”

“We did not request additional space or storage and our understanding is that BNSF has adequate infrastructure to handle our rail traffic,” Phillips 66 spokesman Jeff Callender wrote in an email.

Wallace said that the project is “for the good of several customers in and around the Cherry Point area, not for any one particular customer.”

Conflicting information

“BNSF’s failure to provide honest and accurate information to the Utilities and Transportation Commission is sufficient to deny the closure,” Birch Bay resident Paula Rotondi said at the hearing. “BNSF has provided contradictory and inaccurate information.”

Rotondi pointed to BNSF’s statements that the closure would allow existing customers to receive and depart full trains without blocking the mainline or switches, while in other permits, specifically for the refineries, it had stated that no expansions were needed.

Other speakers questioned parking oil trains at that siding.

“I believe we need additional scrutiny for these projects,” said Dena Jensen, a Birch Bay resident. “This project seeks to store such trains containing volatile materials not near industry, but near roads and public space where people may be near them.”

BNSF has strict guidelines for operating crude oil unit trains, which are not to be left unattended on the mainline or sidings, except by narrow exemptions under specific circumstances as allowed by the Federal Railroad Administration, Wallace said.

Another speaker, Ravyn Whitewolf, said BNSF’s submitted material contained several errors, including a traffic estimate much lower than the county’s own data.

BNSF’s petition states the crossing has 90 vehicles cross per day, on average.

But Whatcom County’s counts show an average of about 350 vehicles per day cross there, according to a letter from Joe Rutan, county engineer and assistant director of Public Works.

Some speakers at the hearing Tuesday questioned whether the expansion of the Custer spur could be considered illegal “piecemealing,” by breaking up a project that would be required to undergo more scrutiny into smaller projects that require less regulation.

While phased review is allowed in some instances under state law, it is not appropriate when it would “merely divide a larger system into exempted fragments or avoid discussion of cumulative impacts,” Matt Petryni, clean energy program manager for RE Sources for Sustainable Communities, pointed out in a written comment.

County opposed

Whatcom County also expressed concerns that the project, which BNSF calls the “Intalco Yard Expansion,” appears to include significant improvements to the Custer Spur that would be needed for the proposed Gateway Pacific Terminal coal export facility.

In a document submitted as evidence, Roland Middleton, special programs manager for county Public Works, points out the state environmental review for GPT is not yet complete.

“In addition, for the recent expansion by BP and Phillips 66, they stated in their permit submittal that no additional rail capacity or improvements were needed,” Middleton states. “To move forward with elements of the Gateway Pacific Terminal project prior to completion of the SEPA review would not be allowed under the Washington Administrative Code.”

In another document, Pierre Bordenave, an environmental consultant for BNSF, rejected Middleton’s statement, saying the Intalco Yard Expansion project is separate from the improvements needed for GPT. He explained the project was meant for existing customers at Cherry Point regardless of whether GPT is permitted.

BNSF officials declined to state which existing customers would be served by the project, or whether the announcement that Alcoa would curtail production at its Ferndale smelter would eliminate the need for the project.

“No single customer’s project triggered the need for more track,” Wallace wrote. “It is not tied to possible future growth that may nor not come with projects such as Gateway Pacific Terminal; it is to accommodate current volumes. It is important to remember that we operate as a rail system, so this siding extension helps with the fluidity of traffic on our whole network — beyond Cherry Point.”

Bordenave also said the Army Corps of Engineers had determined on Sept. 5, 2014, that the projects were independent of one another.

What’s next

Both BNSF and the county will need to turn in their next briefs on the proposed closing to the UTC by Jan. 8, 2016.

Documents related to the case can be found at utc.wa.gov by searching for docket number “150189.”

This story was originally published December 2, 2015 at 5:35 PM with the headline "BNSF request to close road at crossing in Whatcom questioned."