HOT SPRINGS — Although official confirmation from BNSF (Burlington Northern Santa Fe) Railway is couched in publicrelations vagueness, it appears that the railroad is planning to close its Edgemont yard. That could mean most or all of the 100 employees will not have jobs at that location, multiple sources suggested.
Rumors of BNSF pulling out of Edgemont have percolated for years, but this time the action is likely, according to sources. “It does sound pretty definite,” said Edgemont Mayor Rheta Reagan. “It’s more in the works than people realize, although it’s not something we want to hear.”
When Reagan learned that workers had received emails from BNSF proposing to run its coal freight cars from Alliance, Neb., to Guernsey, Wyo., without stopping in Edgemont, Reagan contacted State’s Attorney Lance Russell for more information.
Russell said he had communicated with staff in the Governor’s office, who reported they “had reached out to BN,” but had no further details. Russell also asked the Governor’s office “to put me in touch with the State Railroad Authority and the Department of Transportation,” and he had “hoped they would get back to me,” but as of Monday, March 24, he was still operating on “third-hand information.”
The proposed three-legged trip from a home terminal in Alliance would run empty cars to Gillette, loads from Gillette to Guernsey, and then back to Alliance. With overnights in Gillette and Guernsey, the loop would take from 60-72 hours, said sources. While no implementation date has been set, the aim is to make the changes “sooner rather than later,” according to one union source, with the proposal drafted and ready to be sent to the relevant union chairmen.
Although no implementation date has been set, the ‘Article 9’ and arbitration process for Edgemont is likely to take at least a year. A follow-up meeting with the union is scheduled within a month, with further discussions expected in May, the union source said; Mayor Reagan also mentioned a May meeting.
BNSF General Director Public Affairs Lena Kent wrote: “BNSF has initiated discussions with local employees and union representatives in Edgemont, SD about operational changes necessary to remain a competitive transportation provider on our coal routes. Shifts in market demand require that we adjust operations accordingly.”
The email continued: “We will have additional meetings to continue collectively exploring options for how we continue operating under the ongoing structural changes to our coal network.”
The Fall River County Commissioners had also heard about the rumored closure, and Chairman Joe Falkenburg drafted a letter to the railroad, which was approved by the commissioners at last Thursday’s meeting.
The BNSF employees staff four “boards” at Edgemont: engineers, extra engineers, conductors and extra conductors, with 27 employees residing in Edgemont, Reagan said, and others living in Hot Springs, as well as Custer and Rapid City and Nebraska. Discontinuing the Edgemont stop “would cause a great deal of economic hardship for your employees who…would have to move their lives and families and go to either Gillette, WY or Alliance, NE, as well as for Fall River County as a whole,” the Commissioner’s letter said.
The Fort Worth-based railroad, privately owned by Warren Buffett, is pursuing these changes because of market forces such as declining coal use at power plants because of lower natural gas prices as well as increasing competition from the Union Pacific railroad to haul coal, note sources.
BNSF laid off hundreds of workers from Oklahoma, Kansas, Montana and Nebraska in February, according to a March 1 article in the Torrington Telegram. “We have team members in locations on the network where there isn’t sufficient work and simultaneously not enough team members where the growth is occurring,” the newspaper quoted Kendall Kirkham Sloan, BNSF Director of External Communications.