Watco taking “Flyer” on OK passenger line

The short line operator is looking to start passenger rail service between Oklahoma's two largest cities.

A subsidiary of Watco Companies, LLC, is seeking proposals to operate passenger rail service, called the Eastern Flyer, between Del City, a suburb of Oklahoma City, and Sapulpa, outside Tulsa, which hasn’t hosted passenger trains since 1967.

The state of Oklahoma in 2014 awarded the Stillwater Central Railroad the opportunity to purchase the 97.5-mile Sooner Sub line. Stillwater had been operating over the central-northcentral line at the time.

The railroad was mandated to bring the Sooner Sub to meet Federal Railroad Administration Class 3 track conditions, which Stillwater Central Railroad expected would cost $2.35 million.

The company had invested $16 million in the Sooner Sub from 1998 to 2014, and the railroad planned a capital and maintenance program that would invest between $2.4 and $2.6 million per year on the Sooner Sub throughout the next decade, anticipating a total cost of capital and maintenance expenditures during the next 10 years to reach about $25 million.

The railroad had also partnered with Iowa Pacific Holdings to explore passenger rail options in Oklahoma, according to previous reporting. Iowa Pacific in 2014 operated demonstration trains between Oklahoma City and Sapulpa, but plans for full-time service never were realized. Through its purchase of the Sooner Sub, the railroad would maintain its 275-mile network in the state.

The Stillwater Central Railroad interchanges with Class I railroads BNSF, Union Pacific Railroad and Kansas City Southern, in addition to multiple shortlines.