Repairs to key freight railroad bridge extend life by 30 years

Minnesota Commercial Railway has completed repairs on the troubled South 31st Avenue freight railroad bridge in Minneapolis’ Longfellow neighborhood, a key link in the freight rail network serving Twin Cities businesses and industries.
The bridge, which is not owned by Minnesota Commercial but which it is obligated to repair under the terms of the firm’s lease with Canadian Pacific Railway, serves the historic Hiawatha Avenue Mill & Industrial District, a major employment center that includes manufacturing facilities for General Mills, ADM, Leder Brothers and other firms. The right of way over the bridge is shared with the Hennepin County Regional Rail Authority, as well as daily pedestrian and bicycle traffic on the Midtown Greenway, which crosses over it. The bridge is also a vital connection in delivering oversized passenger rail cars to Metro Transit’s Hiawatha Avenue maintenance facility, many of them destined for the Southwest Corridor line, currently under construction.
Wayne Hall, co-president of Minnesota Commercial, said the repairs were partially funded by a financial grant of $210,000 won by his firm in a competitive process conducted by MnDOT’s Minnesota Rail Services Improvement (MRSI) program, augmented by the company’s own funds. The total cost of the repairs was $224,000. The company paid the difference – the result of the increase in the cost of supplies and labor between the time the grant was awarded and repairs were begun – $14,000 out of internal company funds. Inflation has hit the railroad industry hard in the last year, as wooden ties have risen from $54 each to $70, and the quality has gone down which means their useful life is shorter than before. Ballast (rock) has increased by 10% and other supplies have all increased by 10%.
“Our repairs extended the life of the bridge by 30 years by addressing the damage done by corrosion that has eaten away at its steel underpinnings for many years,“ said Hall.
Completed and put into service in 1913, the bridge in 2021 carried more than 5,000 rail cars, each with a 125 ton load, or more than half a million tons of incoming or outgoing freight – “the equivalent,” Hall said, “of more than 16,000 semi-truck loads that would otherwise be traveling on city streets and through local neighborhoods.
“An analysis of the bridge’s condition conducted by Southwest Bridge Engineers in 2019 found that its continued safe operations and reliability were seriously threatened,” Hall said, and concluded that its useful life had been dramatically shortened by the damage. It also found that if not addressed on an urgent basis, it could potentially require a total replacement at an estimated cost in the millions.
The newly completed repairs include replacement of bearings, columns, column bases and related anchor bolts, all of which are key to the bridge’s continued capability to carry the heavy weights of daily freight deliveries to Minnesota Commercial’s customers and shipments of finished products to markets.