NYSW to Acquire, Operate OCIDA’s 10-mile Jamesville Cluster

Cooperstown, N.Y.-based New York, Susquehanna & Western (NYSW) has filed a verified notice of exemption under 49 CFR 1150.41 to acquire and operate approximately 10 miles of rail line from the Onondaga County (N.Y.) Industrial Development Agency (OCIDA).

The line, known as the Jamesville Cluster, comprises the Jamesville Industrial Track, extending from approximately milepost 264.3 to approximately milepost 272.0; Lake Industrial Track, running from approximately milepost 272.0 to approximately milepost 273.5 (including the Saltland Spur); and Track 7 of the Chicago Line, extending from approximately milepost 292.0 to approximately milepost 292.8 (known to NYSW as mileposts 274.0 to 274.8), the Surface Transportation Board (STB) reported in the Federal Register’s Aug. 23 edition (download below).

According to the verified notice, NYSW is the current line operator, having received authority for local and overhead trackage rights in 1995 by assignment from Conrail, which also assigned to NYSW its right to re-acquire the line from OCIDA. The verified notice states that NYSW is now exercising that right, STB reported.

NYSW certifies that the proposed line acquisition does not involve any interchange commitments and that its projected revenues, as a result of the transaction, will not result in the creation of a Class II or Class I railroad, according to STB. “Pursuant to 49 CFR 1150.42(e), if a carrier’s projected annual revenues will exceed $5 million, it must, at least 60 days before the exemption becomes effective, post a notice of its intent to undertake the proposed transaction at the workplace of the employees on the affected lines, serve a copy of the notice on the national offices of the labor unions with employees on the affected lines, and certify to the Board that it has done so,” the agency reported. “However, NYSW has filed a request for waiver of the 60-day advance labor notice requirements to allow the transaction to become effective 30 days after NYSW’s notice of exemption was filed. NYSW’s waiver request will be addressed in a separate decision. The Board will establish the effective date of the exemption in its separate decision on the waiver request.”

According to NYSW, this action is categorically excluded from environmental review under 49 CFR 1105.6(c) and from historic reporting requirements under 49 CFR 1105.8(b), STB said.

Petitions for stay must be filed no later than Aug. 30, 2023.

NYSW operates more than 400 miles of track in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, serving 85-plus customers and transporting commodities such as feed ingredients, lumber and other building materials, chemicals, aggregates, food products, paper products, motor vehicles, and metals. It interchanges with CSX at Syracuse, N.Y., and North Bergen, N.J., and with Norfolk Southern at Binghamton, N.Y., and Marion Interchange, N.J.