"From the great Atlantic Ocean to the wide Pacific shore; from the queen of flowin' mountains to the southland by the shore." These opening lines from the old song "Wabash Cannonball" refer to the reputation of the train from which the song takes its name.

By Charles Peterson and Frank McManus

Like the train referred to in the song, rail, as an alternative to truck, has been used for hauling waste "from the great Atlantic Ocean to the wide Pacific shore; from the queen of flowin' mountains to the southland by the shore" since the late 1980s.

After a period of rapid growth in the number of regular rail-served operations, the level of rail-haul operations has stabilized. Closure of close-in landfills that serve the two largest cities in the United States - New York and Los Angeles - might lead to the start of a new generation of waste-by-rail operations.

History in America

Seemingly a recent transport option, using railroads to ship waste actually began about 100 years ago. Rail-haul programs were operating in at least three cities - Chicago, Cleveland, and New Orleans - a century ago. Waste discarded in Washington, D.C., and San Francisco was being shipped by rail in the 1930s. The District of Columbia operation, which included ash from D.C. incinerators, used gondola cars to ship the waste to a landfill, and this rail-haul operation continued until the 1950s.

Interest in rail haul, at least on a research and demonstration basis, continued in the 1960s and 1970s. Studies on suitable rail transport equipment and transfer station designs were undertaken by the federal government, railroads, and others, leading to demonstration projects in St. Paul, MN (1973), and Omaha, NE (1977).

Recent Era

Closure of numerous local landfills and the move to regional landfills led to an increase in the distance that waste needed to be hauled to disposal sites, which added to the total cost (transport and disposal, or T&D) for local communities. Not only has rail been used for the long haul of waste, but it also has been used as an alternative to truck in areas with congested roads.

One of the first companies to use rail haul for long distance hauling of waste was Interstate Bi-Modal Inc. (IBMI). IBMI used rail to ship ash from incinerators/waste-to-energy facilities in Connecticut and on Long Island to landfills in Arkansas and Ohio. Although it was one of the first long-haul-of-waste operations, certainly on a regular basis rather than for cleanup of a site, IBMI's real innovation was the use of intermodal equipment.

Intermodal equipment allowed containerized waste to shift between rail and truck, which eliminated the need for the loading area and the disposal site to be rail served. With an intermodal operation, containerized waste can be loaded at a transfer station and trucked to a suitable rail siding, placed onto a railcar, and shipped to another rail siding near or at a landfill.

US Operating Programs

Development of rail-haul programs for municipal waste for the most part has occurred in the more densely populated areas of the country - the Northeast and primarily the coastal states in the West. These are areas where road congestion and distance to disposal sites can provide an opportunity for rail-over-truck transport.

A sample of regular ongoing rail shipments of municipal waste in the US is shown in Table 1. Rail-haul operations involving shipment of recyclables, sludge (biosolids), construction-and-demolition debris, and site cleanups and hazardous wastes are examples of other waste-related freight handled by the railroads.

In addition to the regional landfills previously listed, other sites, such as Herzog Environmental (New Mexico) and various disposal facilities in Ohio, are rail served.

A brief overview of two of these rail operations - in Montgomery County, MD, and Roanoke, VA - is provided as follows. These projects cover the typical transfer processes and equipment (intermodal and high-sided gondolas) associated with most rail-haul operations involving municipal waste.

One exception is the rail move from the Bronx. This operation uses 63 yd.³ aluminum containers with detachable lids. A wheel loader with a bucket is used to dump waste into the containers and compact it. The containers have slots that allow wheel loaders with forks to shuttle the containers between rail and truck. Developed by Intermodal Technologies Inc., the containers were initially used by Chambers Development Company in the early 1990s for shipment of waste from Bergen County, NJ, ash from the Essex County Resource Recovery Facility, sludge from New York City, and waste from other locations in the Northeast. Chambers merged with USA Waste, which subsequently acquired Waste Management.

Montgomery County, MD (Municipal Waste and Ash)

A populous jurisdiction adjacent to Washington, D.C., Montgomery County is urban except in some northern sections. In 1982, the County built a transfer station to consolidate waste and reduce truck traffic to its in-county landfill.

As the landfill was reaching capacity, the County elected to develop a waste-to-energy facility. The facility was sited in the northwest corner of the county, adjacent to a coal-fired power plant. The 1,800 tpd waste-to-energy plant, operated by Covanta Energy, began operation in 1995.

MUNICIPAL WASTE RAIL HAUL

Only about 25 mi. from the transfer station, the waste-to-energy plant is in a rural area with rolling hills served by narrow, twisting roads. The County decided that trucking waste from the transfer station to the waste-to-energy facility was not an acceptable option. In 2003, the transfer station shipped an average of 12,300 tons per week of trash to the waste-to-energy facility. If a truck option had been chosen by the County, shipment of this would have meant about 112 transfer-trailer loads per day.

A rail-haul alternative made sense to the County for two important reasons. The transfer station borders a mainline CSX track. This same track passes near the waste-to-energy facility, and there was already a siding to the coal-fired power plant. At the transfer station, a new siding was built to allow railcars to be loaded at the transfer station; a new spur to the waste-to-energy facility was built from the track leading to the coal-fired power plant.

At the transfer station, waste is dumped on a tipping floor or a pit. On the floor, wheel loaders (Caterpillar 950G) push the waste into one of two slots that lead to two Amfab compactors. A track loader (Cat D8) is used in the pit to push waste into a third Amfab compactor. Each of the units, rated at 100 tph, processes an average of 65 tph. A fourth unit is being added to enable the transfer station to handle growth in the county's wastestream. About 60,000 tpy of nonburnable waste is trucked to an Allied Waste Industries landfill in southern Virginia (Brunswick).

The Amfab units compact the waste into logs that weigh about 27 tons. Compacted waste is pushed into intermodal containers that are 40 ft. in length and 8 ft. in width and height. There are 210 steel containers in the system. A yard tractor (Ottawa) pulls loaded trailers to a weigh scale where the loads are scanned by a radiation detector. Waste is also scanned by a radiation detector on the inbound weigh scales.

Weighed intermodal containers are pulled to the rail yard, which is several hundred yards from the transfer station. At the rail yard, one of two overhead cranes (Mi-Jack) locks onto the top of containers and lifts them off the trailer chassis. The containers are either placed onto a railcar or stacked for later loading. Containers are double-stacked on railcars. A sideloader top-pick also is used with empty containers to load them onto the trailer chasses and to stack for storage.

The rail yard has four tracks for loading/unloading that can accommodate 48 railcars. In addition, there is a runaround track that allows the locomotive to move from one end of the loading/unloading track to the other. CSX Transportation, a subsidiary of CSX Corporation, provides a dedicated locomotive and crew that move the railcars between the transfer station and the waste-to-energy plant. The locomotive is stored at the transfer station rail yard overnight.

A loaded train with 47 cars (waste payload of about 2,450 tons) leaves the transfer station five and sometimes six days per week by 8:00 a.m. Departure time is critical because the train can only be on the mainline track for a limited window of time.

At the waste-to-energy plant in Dickerson, MD, there is a rail yard similar to the one at the transfer station. Loaded containers are removed from railcars with an overhead crane (Mi-Jack) and placed on truck chasses (Galbreath). Hauled to the tipping floor of the adjacent waste-to-energy plant, waste is unloaded into a storage pit. From the pit, waste is fed by crane into a combustion unit. The heat released during combustion is recovered as steam, which is used to generate electricity.

ASH RAIL HAUL

Ash, a byproduct of the combustion process, requires disposal, and in a 15-year agreement that began in June 1997, the County contracted with Allied for landfill of the ash.

Twenty-foot-long intermodal containers are loaded at the waste-to-energy plant and trucked to the adjacent rail yard, where a sideloader lifts the containers onto railcars. About 14 railcars loaded with ash containers are shipped five days per week to a rail siding near Allied's landfill in Brunswick. The landfill, located in southern Virginia, is about 240 mi. from the waste-to-energy plant.

At the rail siding near Allied's landfill, the loaded intermodal containers are transferred to trucks and driven to the landfill where the ash is disposed of in a designated disposal cell. Emptied containers are lifted onto the railcars and returned to the waste-to-energy plant.

Roanoke, VA

Situated 140 mi. west and south of Richmond, VA, the city of Roanoke, along with Roanoke County and the Town of Vinton, formed the Roanoke Valley Resource Authority (RVRA) in 1992. In May 1994, RVRA began a rail-haul program for the shipment of 700 tpd of municipal waste from the authority's transfer station to its Smith Gap ­landfill.

Waste collected by the member jurisdictions is brought to RVRA's transfer station in Roanoke. The transfer station is adjacent to the Norfolk Southern's rail yard, and the building was designed to resemble nearby historic Norfolk Southern shops.

Waste received at the transfer station is unloaded onto a tipping floor. Wheel loaders are used to push waste into either of two floor slots. High-sided gondola cars are positioned under the slots to receive the waste. A mobile crane with a plate is positioned at each slot to tamp waste into the railcars.

Prior to loading, railcars are spotted under a hoist that lifts steel lids. The lock-down lids are replaced on the top of the cars after being loaded. A trackmobile is used to shuttle railcars at the transfer station.

The 30 railcars in the fleet each have a 303 yd.³ capacity. The average payload per car is 65 tons.

At the end of each day, between 10 and 12 loaded cars are formed into a train known as the Waste Line Express and pulled by the Norfolk Southern to the authority's landfill, 33 mi. from the transfer station. At the landfill station, cars are spotted for unloading the next day. The locomotive returns to Roanoke with the cars unloaded that day.

Emptying the railcars is done with a rotary dumper. Railcars are locked into the dumper that rotates, causing the waste to fall onto the tipper building floor. Waste is loaded into a haul truck and taken to the landfill about 1 mi. away.

International Operating Programs

Rail is used in several countries in Europe (England and Germany), as well as in South Africa and Japan. In other countries - for example, Ireland (Iarnród Éireann) - national railroad companies are actively soliciting waste transport business.

ENGLAND

Several rail-transport operations are ongoing in England. Since 1977, waste from West London has been transported by rail. Currently two of the transfer stations (Brentford and South Ruislip) in the West London Waste Authority (WLWA), a six-borough region, sends 67% (650,000 tpy) of WLWA's waste that goes to landfill by rail. The balance of the Authority's waste is hauled by truck, with a small amount shipped by barge.

Another entity, the North London Waste Authority (NLWA), ships 300,000 tpy of waste from its Hendon transfer station by rail to a landfill. In addition, NLWA, a seven-borough jurisdiction, trucks 200,000 tpy to a landfill and operates a waste-to-energy facility that receives 450,000 tpy.

A recent (May 2003) initiative was the start of a 25-year service contract to manage the 590,000 tpy of waste discarded within the four boroughs of the East London Waste Authority (ELWA). In addition to recycling and composting, the contractor (Shanks Group plc, the largest independently owned waste management company in the United Kingdom) is using rail to transport the remaining waste (currently about 550,000 tpy) to a landfill.

The fourth London waste authority (Western Riverside Waste Authority) ships 500,000 tpy of containerized waste on a fleet of eight barges to a landfill.

The Bath and North East Somerset Authority that covers an area located about 100 mi. west of London also uses rail to send waste to a landfill. The Authority is responsible for waste collection and disposal. Two transfer stations are part of the Authority's program, as is the rail-haul system. About 55,000 tpy is shipped 75 mi. by rail to a landfill. An additional 33,000 tpy is trucked to another landfill in a neighboring county.

Waste has been transported by rail to landfill from Bath since the mid 1980s. In 2001, the city of Bristol, a nearby larger city, joined in the Authority's rail-haul program. The 215 tpd of waste from the Bath area is compacted into reinforced ISO (International Organization for Standardization) containers, with an average payload of almost 15 tons. The containers are trucked a short distance and loaded onto railcars. The train with the waste containers proceeds to Bristol, where an additional 36 containers are added.

Manchester, England and Edinburgh, Scotland also use rail to ship waste to ­landfills.

SOUTH AFRICA

A pressing need to replace an aging long-haul truck fleet led the city of Cape Town, in conjunction with Spoornet, the South African railroad company, to initiate rail transport in 1995. Waste is baled at a transfer station and trucked to a rail siding, where the bales are placed onto flatcars and shipped about 20 mi. to a landfill. The baling operation was replaced with a compactor that loads waste into a container for shipment.

More recently, in 1999, the need for an environmentally suitable disposal option led the municipality of Knysna, which is in the Western Cape Province as is Cape Town, to enter into an agreement to use a private landfill about 70 mi. away. Spoornet took an active role in the development of this project, including construction of a transfer station. After waste is compacted and containerized, it is shipped by rail to the landfill.

Future US Operations

A need for long-term disposal to serve the two largest cities in the US could result in a significant increase in waste shipped by rail.

NEW YORK CITY

Closure of New York City's only remaining in-city landfill - Fresh Kills on Staten Island - led to several contracts for the transport and disposal of municipal waste. The landfill closed in March 2001 and reopened on an emergency basis to accept debris from the World Trade Center after it was destroyed by terrorists.

Since closure of the city's landfill, almost all of the residential waste that was being sent to Fresh Kills for disposal, plus commercial waste (about 25,000 tpd), is being trucked to disposal sites outside the city. About 1,250 trucks per day would be using the bridges and tunnels to exit the city if all of this waste were hauled out in transfer trailers with 20-ton payloads.

A number of ongoing planning activities to provide a long-term transport and disposal program have been underway by the city's Department of Sanitation (DOS). One DOS effort is to retrofit some or all of the eight marine transfer stations (MTS) to containerize waste. The intermodal containers would be moved by barge to a site for transfer to rail or directly to a disposal facility. Previously DOS-collected waste delivered to the MTSs was bulk-loaded into barges that held up to 700 tons. The waste was barged to Fresh Kills, where it was landfilled.

Separately DOS is seeking contractors to operate the retrofitted MTSs and provide the transport and disposal of the waste received at each facility. Also, the city is seeking contractors that would provide new transfer stations to allow barge or rail transport to out-of-city disposal sites.

DOS anticipates that it will have a long-term transport and disposal plan in place by the middle of 2007.

LOS ANGELES

A combination of recycling facilities, waste-to-energy plants, and landfills are used to manage the waste generated by the 5.4 million inhabitants in the County Sanitation Districts of Los Angeles County (Sanitation Districts), a confederation of 25 independent sanitation districts.

The Sanitation Districts operates one landfill inside its jurisdiction, Puente Hills, which receives an average of 12,000 tpd. With a permit expansion, Puente Hills landfill has capacity for 38 million tons of waste. Two other landfills owned by the Sanitation Districts are outside its boundaries. Both landfills, Calabasas and Scholl Canyon, are located west of the Sanitation Districts and have limited disposal capacity.

Even though Puente Hills landfill, with a permit expansion, has capacity for 38 million tons, Sanitation Districts is planning for the eventual closure of the existing landfills. In addition to expanding its recycling program, the Sanitation Districts acquired two landfills in remote areas between 125 and 150 mi. east of central Los Angeles County. One site, Mesquite Regional, is located adjacent to the Mesquite Gold Mine in the desert region of Imperial County. The second landfill, Eagle Mountain, was formerly an iron ore mine in Riverside County. Because of the mining operations, there is rail service in the vicinity of the two future landfills.

Active planning is underway for the development of a rail system that could be used to deliver waste to Mesquite Regional landfill. Depending on the materials-recovery/transfer-station option selected, the system would use intermodal or conventional railcars, such as high-sided gondolas. The rail system could be operational as early as 2009.

Ongoing legal challenges raise a question about when Eagle Mountain landfill will open, a question that can probably be attributed to the site's proximity to Joshua Tree National Park. The park borders the landfill property on three sides.

Both landfills could receive 20,000 tpy and have disposal capacities that would allow the sites to receive waste for 100 years.

Although the two new landfills will provide the Sanitation Districts with substantial disposal capacity, the transport and disposal cost for these facilities will be three times higher than current landfill costs ($19/ton). The Sanitation Districts is planning a gradual shift of waste to the new landfills to ease the cost impact of taking waste there.

Conclusion

An initial period of enthusiasm for rail haul of municipal waste followed the closure of numerous landfills. This led to the start of a number of rail-haul operations from the late 1980s to the mid-1990s. More recently there have been limited new programs that involve municipal waste.

Rail haul has an increasing role as disposal sites, particularly landfills, become more distant from populated areas where the majority of municipal waste is discarded. Rail can ease highway congestion by moving waste out of trucks and onto the rail network. Furthermore, on longer-distance moves, rail is an economic alternative to truck.

Charles Peterson has 30 years' experience in waste management and has served as regional general manager for the former Chambers Development Company's rail-haul operations. Frank McManus, with 30 years' experience as a publisher and an editor of waste management news, was the developer, along with Peterson, of two conferences on the rail haul of waste.

MSW - May/June 2004