CHARLESTON, W.Va. — State lawmakers next want to talk with Norfolk Southern to see if there’s a way to save the Heartland Gateway Intermodal facility in Wayne County.
Lawmakers meeting Tuesday as the part of the Legislative Oversight Commission on Transportation Accountability continued to ask questions about the state’s investment and promotion of the facility.
Wayne County Commission President Robert Pasley criticized the past two governors for not putting more effort behind the project.
“This administration and the previous administration failed miserably to do due diligence to market this facility,” Pasley said. “Not only do they not have customers. They never even contacted customers in the Pritchard Industrial Park and local businesses that would use this facility–they were never contacted.”
State officials decided in July that the Heartland Intermodal Gateway wasn’t living up to its original promise and that it would need to be privatized.
The facility, which opened in 2015, is meant to provide a truck-to-rail transfer option along a 530-mile stretch of railway from the Port of Virginia in Hampton Roads through West Virginia to Chicago.
The project was a joint venture, with federal and state funding along with Norfolk Southern. The state’s funding was about $18 million of the nearly $35 million project.
State Transportation Secretary Byrd White told the committee Tuesday the facility has cost the state about $500,000 a year to operate while earning very few dollars in return.
“Our total revenue since inception is $30,797.31,” White said. “That’s since it started to fiscal year 2019.”
White said the state met with Norfolk Southern last May about the project. The rail company wanted 15,000 lifts a year minimum. There were just more than 500 lifts last budget year. NS granted permission in June for the facility to be used for something other than an intermodal facility.
“They informed us on Oct. 1 they would no longer service it as an intermodal facility. They’ve informed us several times since that they would service it but not as an intermodal faculty,” White said.
Pasley and fellow Wayne County Commissioner Kenneth Adkins urged lawmakers to step in and help keep the promise made to the area about the facility’s potential economic impact.
“We want this to go forward and develop it. Don’t let it go to Norfolk Southern who could chain it up and make it a weed patch again,” Pasley said.
Adkins said the project is a prime example of why government should not operate business.
“Government needs to create an opportunity for business and then get the heck out of the way and allow business to operate,” Adkins said.