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The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) recently announced the state transportation commission approved grants totaling $12.9 million for 11 freight-rail infrastructure projects, including several short-line projects. Funding will be provided through the Rail Freight Capital Budget/Transportation Assistance Program and be administered by PennDOT’s Bureau of Rail Freight.

The grants include:
• $4.3 million to Kiski Junction Railroad Inc. to extend a spur nine miles along the Allegheny River to serve an expanding coal mine;
• $1.6 million to United States Gypsum to build 10 industrial tracks totaling 26,000 feet of track and install 11 switches;
• $1.4 million to Allegheny Valley Railroad Co. to reconstruct and replace track, replace a mainline turnout and install ties;
• $1.3 million to Pittsburgh and Ohio Central Railroad to restore out-of-service tracks in Scully Yard, increase yard capacity and rehabilitate a west yard;
• $900,000 to Allegheny & Eastern Railroad to construct a new siding, replace culverts, and install new turnouts, switch ties and ties;
• $793,100 to D&H Railway Co. to construct bulk commodity receiving, handling and transfer facilities at Boyd Station;
• $713,580 to the SEDA-COG Joint Rail Authority to reconstruct 1,114 feet of street-running track in Lewistown;
• $595,000 to the Westmoreland County Industrial Development Corp. to replace an aging wooden-pile trestle with a steel-pile trestle bridge;
• $526,653 to Wheeling & Lake Erie Railway Co. to replace track structure in the Greentree and Hickory tunnels, replace ballast, install tunnel drains, and improve surface and line track;
• $525,000 to River Hill Coal Co. Inc. to install a new scale, purchase loading equipment and rehabilitate 2,000 feet of track; and
• $202,300 to Locust Valley Coal Co. to rehabilitate track and repair misaligned rails and three bridges.