transportation

According to the Washington State Department of Transportation, a project to improve 34 miles of railroad track between Davenport and Wilbur recently received a $37.7 million grant from the Federal Railroad Administration.  DOT says the grant, from the Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and Safety Improvements program, will be used to continue enhancements on the state-owned Palouse River and Coulee

Farms and fields are getting larger and farther apart.  That means farm equipment, especially tractors, spend a lot more time on the road.  Bill Durivage, a tire expert at Firestone Ag, explains why choosing the right tires is so important for road travel.   ...

In late September, the U.S. Department of Energy announced a study looking at meeting electrical needs in the event that the four lower Snake River dams were removed.  This news comes of the heals of a variety of studies and proposal looking at removing the dams that are so important to the farming community across the Northwest, and across the nation.  Michell...

Earlier this week, the U.S. Department of Energy announced a study on replacing the Lower Snake River Dams.  DOE said the Pacific Northwest Regional Energy Planning Project will be an 18-month study, exploring how utilities in Idaho, Washington, Oregon and Montana can deal with future power needs in the event that the Snake River dams are removed.  The stu...

Earlier this week, the Surface Transportation Board approved the Kansas City Southern Railway Company acquisition by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, with conditions.  The decision includes an unprecedented seven-year oversight period and contains many conditions designed to mitigate environmental impacts, preserve competition, protect railroad workers, and promote efficient passenger rail.  Th..

There are several key issues the Washington farming community is watching during the current legislative session in Olympia.  Two of the top issues are the Cap and Trade fees being assessed to farmers and food movers, as well as the implementation of overtime in agriculture.  State S...

Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack said he is grateful for Congress taking swift action to prevent a crippling national rail shutdown.   “A rail strike would have had significant and long-lasting effects on the American economy,” Vilsack said. “U.S. farmers a...

If you are out hunting for a real Christmas tree this year experts say with tight supplies of available trees, the sooner you do your tree hunting the better.  But it does look like everybody who wants a real tree will be able to have one but finding one a few days before Christmas might be challenging.  Now whe...

The CEO of CattleFax is confident the beef industry will see better market conditions down the road.  Randy Blach said the market has faced many headwinds over the last three or four years.   “If you step back and you think about what we were sharing last fall and early this year, the markets have largely performed very well with what we anticipated, but obviously we had a Russian invasion into Uk

Farming is a multi-billion-dollar industry for the state of Washington, but Dan Newhouse says more ag business can be done in the Evergreen state.  The central Washington representative said there’s a lot of potential for growth and future development, such as the recent ground breaking of Darigold’s million-dollar facility outside of Pasco.  Newhouse says to en...