Some of my South DaCola foot soldiers have been digging around about Railroads and Federal easements. I guess since the 1800’s Railroads are considered a public utilities like electric transmission lines, and since they are, they don’t actually ‘own’ the land they are operating on, they have an easement from the Federal Government. That being said, when they remove the tracks from that easement land and are no longer using it, the land goes into reversion, in which the Federal Government gives the land to the adjacent property owners.
Like I said, just started digging into this a little, and don’t know all of the details, but if this is true, it means the land that BNSF is trying to sell to the city shouldn’t even be for sale, and some adjacent property owners are about to get a late Christmas gift.
What do you know?
The time and expense for acquisition of the yards is not worth taxpayer expense. Even if successful, there is an undeveled parcel with lots of utilities to reroute. It would become more federally subsidized housing with not enough tax revenue to justify itself. I sure hope the city does not intend to turn this into retail or office. A few private insider developers get rich from this scheme while downtown remains stagnant and city debt blossums another hundred million.
I know that in the middle of Lennox, the BNSF gave the city land it no longer wanted, and about 30 years later the slow-witted city figured out it could sell the land and both get paid and start collecting tax $$$ on it.
Not a fan of this project, in fact I think it should be killed. But you have a hollow argument. The government is paying the RR (through the appropriation) to vacate the property. The government was the original adjacent property owner and the reversion is back the grantor (the government).
So just because a rail line is vacated does not mean the adjacent land owner is automatically guaranteed the land.
The question of who the land reverts to is decided by which Congressional Act it was used by the railroads to gain the right of way. There are many different grant acts used and the original deeds with Congressional action need to be looked at.
The ability to sell something you do not own might be the basis for the project failing so far.