'No brainer': Rock Island Trail follows development path laid by Katy

Public input received in the Missouri State Park's Rock Island Trail survey overwhelmingly favors creating a public nature trail from more of the Rock Island Line Corridor, an unused railroad line currently owned and being dismantled by Ameren's Missouri Central Railroad.

Greg Harris, executive director of trail proponent Missouri Rock Island Inc., said the vast majority of comments received were in favor of converting the abandoned railway into a nature retreat and potential tourist destination.

"I've read probably two-thirds to three-fourths of (the public comments)," Harris said. "There was 8,685 comments, and after a while, they seem to fall into patterns. In fact, it was interesting to me that one of the most common words or phrases that was in that was 'no-brainer.'"

Ameren has offered to donate a 144-mile stretch of railroad line to the the Department of Natural Resources' Division of State Parks, but the state has yet to accept the proposal. Ameren expects all Missouri Central Railroad salvage activities to be completed in 2018. The materials currently are being salvaged between Beaufort and Windsor, said Jeff Trammel, Ameren's communications executive. The salvage contractor has removed about 99 percent of the steel from the right-of-way and is in the process of removing the railroad ties.

Rock Island Trail proponents hope to connect the extended Rock Island Trail to the Katy Trail to create a state loop capable of attracting tourism to various communities along the route and allowing many Missourians better opportunities to experience the outdoors.

Opponents voiced concerns about property rights, potential damage to agriculture and loss of privacy as reasons to reject the trail project.

The survey was operated and is under review by Missouri State Parks to gain insight on public sentiment for the project that would convert railway from Windsor to Beaufort onto the existing 47.5-mile Rock Island Spur.

It is still unknown exactly how much the full conversion would cost and how the parks department would pay for it, but Harris said many of the most difficult aspects of creating such a massive trail are already in place due to the railroad's remaining tunnels and bridges.

"The Rock Island Line project stands to be a significant undertaking, and it is essential to understand the immediate and long-term liabilities, costs, benefits and opportunities specific to this project," Connie Patterson, Missouri Department of Natural Resources director of communications, said in an email. "It is our duty to fully and thoroughly assess this project, a key part of which is engaging stakeholders and the communities who stand to be impacted."

Patterson said public sentiment is an important part of the state's decision-making process, but it isn't the only consideration in a large and complex undertaking, "all of which will be carefully weighed to determine the best option for the State of Missouri," she said.

The cities of Springfield, Rolla, Chesterfield, Owensville and Warsaw, as well as the Kaysinger Basin Regional Planning Commission, Johnson County Commission, University of Central Missouri and Whiteman Air Force Base, submitted comment letters supporting the expansion as a potential economic boom and engine for job creation.

The Missouri Parks Association established a resolution at its annual conference fully supporting the Rock Island Trail project. The resolution stated the trail is a rare and beneficial economic opportunity, citing a 2012 state study of the 237-mile Katy Trail that recorded 400,000 annual users generating a direct annual economic impact of almost $18.5 million.

The Missouri Farm Bureau was the only organization to oppose the trail project in the survey. In its comment, MFB stated its membership adopted a policy that reads: "We favor keeping the old Rock Island Line from Owensville to Kansas City as a railroad, because railroads are vital to agriculture and the economy of rural communities and are a far better choice than the tax burden of building and maintaining a trail. We oppose any effort to create a recreational trail. If efforts to stop the conversion of the rail corridor to a recreational trail fail, then we oppose state or federal taxpayer funding for conversion and maintenance of such a trail."

When asked to respond to MFB's comment, Patterson stated, "In 2014, Missouri Central Railroad Company provided public notice soliciting financial support to continue rail service on the Rock Island Line. No such offers were received within the allotted time frame. Interim trail use would preserve the corridor for potential future use as a rail line."

Harris said it is important for members of the public to understand funding the project could not detract from other dedicated state funds like road maintenance, as some in the survey seemed to contend.

Farmers and ranchers also worry trail users will trespass on their land and interfere with crops or livestock, while some residents who own land on either side of the corridor said they did not want their property split by a public trail.

Harris said he has visited ranchers and farmers who live and work around the already existing Rock Island Spur, and they haven't voiced any major problems with trail users. Those with livestock use a system of large gates that block the trail for the animals to cross over.

Some property owners who voiced dissent in the survey value their privacy and isolated lifestyles and do not want strangers regularly coming near their homes.

Harris had a simple response to that concern: "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."

Another recurring cause for dissent in the public survey was the belief that railway property originally purchased from landowners many years ago through right-of-way laws should go back to the landowners rather than be used as a trail. Some cited original documents stipulating such a return would take place if the line was decommissioned.

However, the National Trail Systems Act approved the practice of railbanking, in which a railroad company agrees to allow a trail agency to use an out-of-service rail corridor as a trail until a railroad may need the corridor again. "Because a railbanked corridor is not considered abandoned, it can be sold, leased or donated to a trail manager without reverting to adjacent landowners," according to the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy website.

If the land were to be fully returned to the landowners, the government feared it would be unable to efficiently re-establish the railroads if the country were to need them in a time of national emergency, such as reliably transporting military supplies and equipment in the case of a foreign invasion.