The Mercury News reports that BNSF Railway has released a draft environmental report for the construction of a planned 500 million dollar rail yard close to the Port of Los Angeles. BNSF’s plan for the creation of this yard is to bring trains closer to the cargo and eliminate emissions and congestion from trucks ferrying containers between the ships and the railroad. BNSF estimates that it will remove 1.5 million truck trips per year from I-710.
Further, BNSF has stated they will only use clean vehicles when needed, and that remaining traffic to and from the new yard will be monitored via GPS to ensure that the remaining trucks are not traveling through residential neighborhoods.
This investment is a prime example of how private industry can be green and efficient. Bringing the containers closer to the trains will reduce environmental pollution from trucks, remove volume from the freeways and best of all, increase efficiency for BNSF. With increased efficiency comes increased profits; and profits allow BNSF to continue to invest in infrastructure.
This is a positive development
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