OmniTRAX Appoints Shariff Gonnella as President, BRG

Written by Marybeth Luczak, Executive Editor

Shariff Gonnella (left) is succeeding Norma Torres as BRG President.

Shariff Gonnella on Aug. 1 will become President of OmniTRAX affiliate Brownsville & Rio Grande International Railway, LLC (BRG), succeeding Norma Torres, a 2021 Railway Age Women in Rail honoree who will retire.

Torres and BRG earned OmniTRAX’s Railroad of the Year Award in 2021 for producing 25% year-over-year carload growth that resulted in a nearly 20% increase in revenue, and for having no FRA-reportable derailments since 2002. She identified market needs, and to support growth, deployed capital projects and doubled the workforce.

OmniTRAX on July 31 reported that Gonnella is a former Amazon global supply chain executive, who has also held key strategic leadership and commercial positions at Convoy, Cargolux Airlines and Singapore Airlines.

The 45-mile BRG provides exclusive rail transportation to all facilities located within the 40,000-acre Brownsville Navigation District at the Port of Brownsville, located at the southern tip of Texas. Traffic includes steel, agricultural products, food products and general commodities. With key cross-border interchanges with Union Pacific and Canadian Pacific Kansas City, BRG is “a strategic import and export artery between the U.S. and Mexico with the capacity to become a complementary trade corridor that offers relief from the growing capacity strains at the Port of Laredo,” which in 2023 “eclipsed volumes at the ports of Los Angeles and Chicago,” said OmniTRAX, a supply-chain and logistics solutions provider and the transportation affiliate of The Broe Group. (The Port of Brownsville is also served by BNSF.)

“Texas has continued to shoulder record-breaking freight volumes—stretching shipping infrastructure capacity to its limits—and Brownsville offers global shippers the much-needed optionality and efficiency to reach worldwide markets,” OmniTRAX President and COO Sergio Sabatini said during the announcement. “Shariff’s vast experience creating international infrastructure capacity and his bold vision to transform the BRG into a dynamic, global freight gateway are the ideal skills to help us meet the ongoing demands of near shoring and international trade.”

“I am honored to join a dynamic OmniTRAX team that shares a vision about the critical importance of international transportation strategies and the bold role the BRG can play,” Shariff Gonnella said. “The BRG presents a unique opportunity to create an unrivaled global gateway that redefines the very landscape of our industry, and I’m excited to join forces with my colleagues to forge the relationships to make that possible.”

“The Port of Brownsville is excited to welcome Shariff Gonnella to our community,” said Esteban Guerra, Chairman of the Board of Commissioners for the Port of Brownsville. “We are looking forward to continued collaboration with Shariff and our valued partners at OmniTRAX. Our team is committed to work together to bring economic growth to the Port and the entire Rio Grande Valley.”