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The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation recently issued grants totaling more than $13 million to help fund 12 freight-rail projects.

In the current fiscal-year budget, Gov. Edward Rendell doubled freight-rail grants and assistance program funds to $20 million and $8.5 million, respectively.

"[The funds] help keep our short-line rail lines competitive and make Pennsylvania more attractive to shippers," said Rendell in a prepared statement.

The grants include:
• $3 million to Lehigh Valley Rail Management to construct railroad storage and customer access tracks in the Bethlehem Commerce Center;
• $2.5 million to the Susquehanna County Rail Authority to build a transload facility;
• $1.5 million to Buffalo & Pittsburgh Railroad Inc. to rehabilitate 34 track miles and a 44-mile mainline to improve a CSX Transportation interchange;
• $1.3 million to Allegheny Valley Railroad Co. to complete the second phase of a track rehabilitation project;
• $1 million to Buffalo & Pittsburgh to replace rail and ties on various curves, and improve switches and signals;
• $850,000 to the Reading, Blue Mountain & Northern Railroad Co. to complete the second phase of a 50-mile continuous-welded rail project;
• $840,000 to Delaware & Hudson Railway Co. Inc. to rehabilitate and construct a two-mile passing siding;
• $525,000 to the Wheeling & Lake Erie Railway Co. to remove and replace the Fox Stop Road Bridge’s structure;
• $501,000 to the Delaware & Hudson to build track and turnouts to expand switching capacity at Taylor Yard; and
• $500,000 to East Penn Railways Inc. to improve a branch line.