Scoping, Design, and Grant-Writing Services
Erdman Anthony provided planning, preliminary engineering, and final design services for the redevelopment of a former Ingersoll Rand castings foundry into a gas-field services facility to serve the needs of the expanding gas-field services industry in the Marcellus Shale Region of New York and Pennsylvania. Commodities to be handled on the 86-acre site and in the 130,000-square-foot main building include frac sand, pipe, water, and other breakbulk products.
The facility was served by an existing industrial spur that had been disconnected from the national rail network circa 2002. The track was constructed in the early 1970s with lightweight rail, poor-quality materials, and curvature in excess of 16 degrees, hampering efforts to restore rail service at the pre-existing location.
Erdman Anthony provided scoping and preliminary engineering services to assist the owner with evaluating site constraints, identifying opportunities to attract potential shippers, enhancing the site’s marketability, and developing a long-term plan for staged implementation.
Our firm also provided grant-writing services to assist the owner and the Tioga County Industrial Development Agency with an application for funding under NYSDOT's Passenger and Freight Rail Assistance Program.
Project highlights included:
• Extensive coordination required with Norfolk Southern, state, county, and local agencies to re-establish an unused grade crossing on a high-volume county road.
• Thirteen alternative track alignments were studied to serve the facility from Norfolk Southern's Southern Tier Line while avoiding impacts to adjacent properties and meeting geometric criteria.
The first phase of the project will construct 2,500 track feet of unloading space and an 800-foot lead to serve a hydraulic fracturing sand transload facility and a water plant.
Future phases will expand the transloading capability of the site by constructing an additional 1,200 track feet, an automobile unloading ramp, and a laydown area for pipe, timber mats, and other breakbulk materials.