U.S. Sen. Jack Reed believes the Third Rail project at Quonset Point/Davisville is moving on schedule and should result in a “first class freight system” within the next two years. But as for the state’s plans to develop a shipping port at the former U.S. Navy base, Reed said, “we’re drifting.”
In each of the last three years, Reed and the rest of Rhode Island’s Congressional delegation have been successful in obtaining federal funds for the Third Rail project – the latest being $10 million as part of the Transportation Appropriations Act for fiscal year 2000.
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“We’re at the point now where we have funded $38 million,” said Reed. “It has been a tough battle every year to make sure we have the money. We have already approached the administration this year to put in the final increment of funding.”
The Third Rail is seen as a critical element in the future of the former U.S. Navy base at Quonset Point/Davisville.
Plans by Amtrak to install a high-speed electrified railway system along the 157-mile leg of the Northeast Corridor between New Haven and Boston have placed the future of freight-rail service in Rhode Island in jeopardy. Freight trains use those Amtrak lines during off-hours, but will not be able to do so when the high-speed system is in place.
The proposed link of the Third Rail from Quonset Point to Central Falls will be 22 miles long.
Many businesses in the state rely heavily on the outcome of this project. For some manufacturers, freight rail service is the only affordable way to transport a heavy volume of raw materials, like lumber, metal and steel. Automobile transport is another industry that relies on rail transportation.
As part of the project, rail beds will have to be made low enough and bridges expanded to accommodate double-stacked freight cars.
Reed has long been a supporter of the Third Rail project. It is critical, he said, if the state is to maintain the businesses that currently operate out of Quonset Point/Davisville and if it is to lure new businesses there.
Among the businesses thriving there now are Toray Plastics, BB&S Treated Lumber and NORAD, a shipping company for new automobiles.
”Absolutely independent of whatever is done in the future, we are creating a first-class freight rail system,” said Reed. “It is maintaining jobs here – and we hope, expanding jobs. It is one of those infrastructure issues that gives us flexibility.”
But Reed is less enthused by the progress – or lack of progress – regarding the state’s plans to build a shipping port at Quonset Point.
”My sense is that we are just drifting along,” he said.
Reed said he would like some answers as to where the project stands now – and where it may or may not be going in the future.
“The bottom line is that it would be a wise investment by the state to determine whether from an environmental perspective this is a feasible proposal,” Reed said. The first set of questions – both substantive and political – are about whether environmentally this project can work. I don’t think we’ve heard from someone that all sides agree is reputable and has given us a thorough scientific analysis. I wish we had done that two years ago. We might have avoided a lot of controversy.”
Quonset Point Partners had proposed a large load center that would occupy as much as 600 acres at the former U.S. Navy base. The idea was – and still is – to use the new port as an entry point for international cargo bound for the Northeast and the Midwest.
But QPP is no longer part of those plans. The developers came up with a series of proposals that would not have required public subsidies. All three of QPP’s plans called for dredging to 45 feet and would have ranged in cost from just over $400 million to just under $600 million. But the plans lacked financial specifics and most problematic, commitments from international cargo carriers.
Gov. Lincoln Almond and the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation’s board of directors rejected QPP’s series of proposals in August 1999.
Since that time, said Lisa Pelosi, a spokesperson for the governor, consultants have been hired by the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation and have been asked to re-examine the overall proposal.
”EDC and the governor’s office have been working with consultants to see what kind of port could realistically be built,” Pelosi said. “We are waiting to hear back from them.”
Does the port at Quonset Point/Davisville remain a priority of the governor?
“Economic development is his number one priority,” Pelosi said. “And developing Quonset Point is one of his top ones – not just the port, but all of Quonset Point/Davisville.”
The lack of movement surrounding the development of the former Navy base appears to be fueling frustration in other corners, including that of Providence Mayor Vincent A. Cianci, Jr. During the course of a two-part interview with the Providence Business News, Cianci said; “Don’t get me started on Quonset, because Quonset ought to be, and I’ve said this since 1980, Quonset Point ought to be the industrial Mecca of the Northeast. Think about it. It has a deep-water port. It has every utility, an airfield. It is within a five-hour drive of probably 35 percent of this country’s population. It’s sitting there, wasted basically.”
And U.S. Congressman Patrick J. Kennedy, in a statement released to the Providence Business News last Tuesday evening, said; “Since the Navy pulled up its stakes, Quonset Point has not been utilized to its full potential. I am encouraged by the few developments in recent years, but much more work needs to be done to fulfill the economic promise that the site holds.”
