The Alexander Railroad Company is a Class III

shortline railroad A shortline railroad is a small or mid-sized railroad company that operates over a relatively short distance relative to larger, national railroad networks. The term is used primarily in the United States and Canada. In the former, railroads are ...

operating in

North Carolina North Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, South Carolina to the south, Georgia (U.S. stat ...

. The railroad has of track that runs northwest from Statesville to Taylorsville,

History

The Alexander Railroad began operations in 1946. The line was marked for abandonment by the Southern Railway, so local investors and businessmen stepped in, purchasing the branch line from Statesville to Taylorsville. The railroad is named after

Alexander County, North Carolina Alexander County is a county established in the U.S. state of North Carolina in 1847. As of the 2020 census, the population was 36,444. Its county seat is Taylorsville. Alexander County is part of the Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton, NC Metropolita ...

, although it serves both

Alexander Alexander () is a male name of Greek origin. The most prominent bearer of the name is Alexander the Great, the king of the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia who created one of the largest empires in ancient history. Variants listed here ar ...

and Iredell Counties. The railroad was originally chartered and built in 1887 as the Statesville & Western, a subsidiary of the Atlantic, Tennessee & Ohio which ran between Charlotte and Statesville, North Carolina. The AT&O was purchased by the Richmond & Danville, and eventually came under the Southern Railway.

Operations

The Alexander Railroad serves 20 customers, handling approximately 2,500 carloads (200,000 tons) per year.Alexander Railroad
''Railway Association of North Carolina'' (retrieved 18 June 2014) Principal commodities carried by the railroad are grain, pulpboard, plastics, lumber products, and scrap paper. The ARC has one connection with

Norfolk Southern The Norfolk Southern Railway is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States. Headquartered in Atlanta, the company was formed in 1982 with the merger of the Norfolk and Western Railway and Southern Railway. The comp ...

at Statesville, NC, which sees daily interchange.

Roster

The Alexander Railroad currently has five operating diesel-electric locomotives. The roster includes: #3 - GE 44 tonner, and four

EMD SW1500 The EMD SW1500 is a diesel-electric switcher locomotive built by General Motors' Electro-Motive Division from 1966 to 1974. The SW1500 replaced the SW1200 in the EMD product line. Many railroads regularly used SW1500s for road freight service. ...

s, #9 and #10 wearing an all over black livery. #11 and #12 wear a more eye catching black and green livery. ARC #11 was photographed working in Taylorsville in March 2013. The ARC has a locomotive servicing shop in Taylorsville, where four of the railroad's five locomotives are kept. The other one is kept in Statesville for switching the yard.

References

General references

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External links