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Mesquite ready to move forward on quiet zone without Sunnyvale
By Kenny Green, kgreen@starlocalnews.com
For the first time in two years, the Mesquite City Council was briefed on the status of the city’s bid to establish a quiet zone through the city for trains passing through the city. The presentation was given to the council by assistant city manager Jerry Dittman.
“We get a lot of phone calls about it asking when we are going to start it,” Dittman said.
The original plan, presented to council in 2010, would establish a quiet zone through the city would eliminate the noise produced by train horns at eight at-grade railroad crossings. The project was presented to encompass at-grade crossings from Larkin Road to Gross Road with the three eastern at-grade railroad crossings being in the town of Sunnyvale.
“We worked back and forth with the railroad to try and save money. They had concerns about the crossing at Larkin Road. There have already been two accidents there. The accidents were because the driveway at Associated Truss Company is too close to the tracks and the tractor-trailers hang out into the intersection,” Dittman said.
The town of Sunnyvale was supposed to address the issue of relocating the driveway with the business but no resolution has been reached on the matter, according to Dittman.
“After two years of coordination with the town of Sunnyvale, no progress has been made on the closing of Berry Road or relocation of the Associated Truss Company driveway along Larkin Road. As originally envisioned, the project remains on hold,” Dittman said.
Dittman said that for the project to move forward the city has three options – The city can continue to wait for the town of Sunnyvale to resolve their two issues, reduce the scope of the project to the five at-grade crossings in Mesquite which include service center southern entrance, Florence Street, North Galloway Avenue, Ebrite Street and Gross Road or reduce the scope of the project to the five at-grade crossings in Mesquite and close Ebrite Street.
The project currently has $250,000 allocated in the approved Mesquite Quality of Life Corporation Budget. For the city to include all the Mesquite at-grade crossings within the project plans the cost would increase to approximately $350,000 due to an equipment upgrade that the city would be required to pay for at the Ebrite crossing. The original plan had the railroad relocating the equipment at the Berry Road crossing, which would be closed, to the Ebrite crossing. The implementation time for this option would be 12 to 24 months to complete the upgrade and establish the quiet zone.
The city could also close the crossing at Ebrite and save the additional funds. Traffic counts taken in June indicate 686 vehicles use the crossing each day, making it a low volume road. The implementation of this option would take six to 12 months.
“Typically one lane of traffic can handle 5,000 vehicles per day without congestion. The two nearest crossings, both of which are four-lane roadways, are at North Galloway Avenue, which handles 13,400 vehicles per day and Carmack Street which handles 2,800 vehicles per day. These crossings have the capacity to handle 20,000 vehicles per day without congestion, so they can easily absorb the traffic from Ebrite Street if it is closed,” Dittman said. “The [Union Pacific Railroad] typically pays cities $25,000 to $50,000 to close an existing at-grade crossing.”
The council reached a consensus to wait on additional information before deciding what option to go with regarding the project. The council also was in favor of waiting to see what, if any, action Sunnyvale takes to complete the project as originally planned. The next council briefing will be in Oct. or Nov. unless Sunnyvale approves the closure of Berry Street earlier.
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