Economic Impact of GDOT’s Short Line Railroads

Short line railroads are critical to Georgia’s transportation infrastructure and support the efficient movement of goods into and out of the State. Twenty-nine short line railroads operate in Georgia, six of which operate either partially or totally on 596 miles of rail track that the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) owns. Based on the Bureau of Economic Analysis RIMS II backward-linkage model, this study estimates under different sets of assumptions the economic impacts associated with short line railroad revenues and with GDOT infrastructure spending on these six short line systems. Among the economic impacts, and depending on the assumptions, the study finds that the cumulative impact of the six systems increases annual output in the range of $2.8-$14.5 million, increases annual earnings in the range of $0.7-$4.1 million, and generates annual value-added in the range of $1.4-$7.5 million. Cumulatively, these systems annually add 10 - 93 jobs on average.

• Record URL:
  http://g92018.eos-intl.net/eLibSQL14_G92018_Documents/16-08.pdf
• 
• Corporate Authors:

  Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta

  790 Atlantic Drive
  Atlanta, GA  United States  30332-0355

  Georgia Department of Transportation

  Office of Performance-Based Management and Research
  Forest Park, GA  United States  GA 30297-2534

  Federal Highway Administration

  1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Authors:
  • McCarthy, Patrick
  • Zhai, Zhe
• Publication Date: 2018-4

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Digital/other
• Edition: Final Report
• Features: Appendices; Figures; Maps; Photos; References; Tables;
• Pagination: 114p

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Economic impacts; Short line railroads
• Identifier Terms: Georgia Department of Transportation; Regional Input-Output Modeling System (RIMS II)
• Geographic Terms: Georgia
• Subject Areas: Economics; Railroads;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01675641
• Record Type: Publication
• Report/Paper Numbers: FHWA-GA-18-1608, RP 16-08
• Contract Numbers: 0014918
• Files: TRIS, ATRI, USDOT, STATEDOT
• Created Date: Jul 21 2018 12:26PM