THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, September 23, 1995 TAG: 9509230269
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CHRISTOPHER DINSMORE, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Short : 44 lines
The small railroad that connects port terminals in South Hampton Roads has won a new national safety award.
The Norfolk and Portsmouth Beltline Railroad Co. lost no time to injuries in 1994. As a result, it was one of seven small railroads nationwide to earn the Jacobson Safety Award.
The Beltline owns and operates 38 miles of rail in Norfolk, Portsmouth and Chesapeake. It provides terminal switching services between cargo terminals in the port of Hampton Roads. It employs 65 people.
``This is a major, major accomplishment for the Beltline employees,'' said Dennis Walker, the line's president and general manager. ``They really worked hard for this.''
Offered for the first time in 1995, the Jacobson Safety Award is the small-railroad equivalent of the Harriman Safety Medal that Norfolk Southern Corp. has won six years running.
The award was established by Jake Jacobson, vice president of the Copper Basin Railroad in Arizona. Jacobson introduced the idea at last year's American Association of Railroad's safety convention. He wanted to recognize the safety accomplishments of small railroads in the way the Harriman recognizes the major railroads.
There were 688 small railroads competing for the Jacobson award, which was open to railroads with fewer than 250,000 employee hours. Jacobson opted to give the award to the seven largest of the 70 railroads that qualified with no time lost to injuries, calling them the ``Magnificent Seven.'' The Beltline was the second largest railroad to win.
The Beltline, which will be 100 years old next year, is 57 percent owned by Norfolk Southern and 43 percent by CSX Transportation Inc., the rail subsidiary of Richmond-based CSX Corp.
While owned by those giant railroads, the Beltline operates as a separate company, maintaining its own tracks and operating locomotives that it leases from Norfolk Southern. by CNB