Transloading process turning into a game changer for TXNW Railway, saving local ag producers millions

SUNRAY, Texas (KAMR/KCIT) — Here on the High Plains, we can see upwards of 100 trains a day across the area.

Given the area’s geographic location of being in the middle of the country, it provides plenty of opportunities for commerce by air, road, and of course, rail.

“Shipping by rail, especially over long distance, is cheaper than shipping by truck,” said Tim Farley, a foreman for the TXNW Railway, a short-line railroad based in Sunray.

“When you’re doing multiple loads a day trying to get these products into the dairies and feedlots that they’re delivering to, it’s just more economical overall,” Farley explained.

Speaking of dairies and feedlots, before the milk, burgers, and steaks wind up on store shelves and on your plate, many of the ingredients used to feed the livestock used to serve them come off of rail cars through a process called transloading.

TXNW services many of the area’s ag producers, big and small, through this process, giving ag producers who otherwise have no access to rail another option to move their product.

“Transloading is we’re bringing railcars, we spot them on the rail, and then a truck will come in and we’ll move the product from the rail to the truck,” said Clayton Fox, Assistant Superintendent of Rail Operations for TXNW.

He told MyHighPlains.com that with the various industries in the area, there are not too many dull moments in service.

“Recently, the oil has dropped off but the dry feed, the grain – we got all the dairies, the feed yards around here. So they keep us busy,” Fox said.

Fox explained that it can take up to twenty minutes to offload one rail car depending on the commodity being offloaded, and there are plenty of them.

“Soy hole pellets, which is a soy-based product, canola pellets, soy plus. We do some canola meal, we do sodium bicarbonate, and we also do magnesium oxide. We also we’ve gotten into the palm oil business,” Farley told MyHighPlains.com.

All of it adds up to millions in savings for area ag producers.

“Think about a farmer that’s having to ship multiple trucks into his facility every day and schedule and everything that goes into that,” said Joey Evans, Director of Business Support and Development for the TNW Corporation, which owns the TXNW Railway. “You know now being able to get that product involved really reduces his cost.”

Evans told us that over the past several years TXNW’s transloading operation has brought in nearly 5,000 railcars, delivering close to one billion pounds of products to the region.

“The possibilities are endless for the growth opportunities here. It started out as biodiesel, which, you know, is a byproduct of fuel, then it grew from there into grain, which is now turned into sodium bicarb (bicarbonate). As that continues to grow and as farmers are looking for different ways to feed their cattle, put more vitamins and minerals into the feed, that could expand from there.”

Transloading from rail to truck or truck to rail also lessens the amount of headaches in traffic and the environment.

Get this, TXNW Railway told MyHighPlains.com that one rail car can take as many as five semi-trailers off of the road. In rail terms, that’s about 400-500 trucks per train.

“Just removing that number of vehicles, the congestion,” said Amber Farley, Superintendent of Railway Operations at TXNW Railway. “Can you imagine if railroads were shut down, how many more cars you wouldn’t get anywhere.”

All of it, for a cleaner, more efficient operation.

For more information on the TXNW Railway, click here.

For the latest Amarillo news and regional updates, check with MyHighPlains.com and tune in to KAMR Local 4 News at 5:00, 6:00, and 10:00 p.m. and Fox 14 News at 9:00 p.m. CST.