We need more Dutchtown Southerns

摘要

Dutchtown Southern, the smallest railroad you've never heard of, just might be the biggest story in railroading. The Watco short line began operations in January on 1.76 miles of track leased from Canadian National in Geismar, La. Located some 20 miles south of Baton Rouge along a bend in the Mississippi River, the Dutchtown Southern parallels the former Illinois Central main and serves a cluster of nine petrochemical plants that fill 35,000 freight cars per year. Watco Chief Commercial Officer Stefan Loeb sees "staggering growth potential" by offering more flexible, more frequent, and more reliable switching. Dutchtown Southern serves the plants every day and gets paid by the carload, so it has every incentive to gain as much volume as possible by doing things like interchanging with the nearby CN yard multiple times a day. What's the big deal about a railroad with less than 2 miles of track and just three locomotives? The Dutchtown Southern could be a model for how Class I railroads can win more business from existing customers by handing local switching over to a short line.