Mt Pleasant,Alma area question

[hoborich]

As I go north on 127, right where it curves to the left and becomes a freeway again, they put in a bunch of tracks this summer, on the right side of the road. It looks like some kind of grain operation maybe. Or maybe an ethanol plant. There are foundations for silos, and other buildings near the tracks. Anybody know whats going on there?

[Raildudes dad]

Check out Liberty Fuels. They'd love to have you buy a number of $25,000 shares in the "locally" owned ethanol plant. They haven't raised enough money to complete it the last I knew.

[AARR]

Why does it seem ethanol in other states is going gang busters but in MI it's stagnated? Or is it just my imagination?

[trainjunkie47]

Its not going gangbusters any more. Virtually no new construction is going on right now. Until gas rises above $3 a gallon, or the price of corn drops further, or government raises the subsidy, ethanol will not be economically viable.

[~Z~]

ethanol will not be economically viable.

Did someone say something about economically viable?

[AARR]

Its not going gangbusters any more. Virtually no new construction is going on right now.

There's quite a few short lines and abandoned track that was brought to life or was in the process of because of ethanol.

[hoborich]

Why does it seem ethanol in other states is going gang busters but in MI it's stagnated? Or is it just my imagination?

It's probably stagnated in other states too, by now.


I noticed everything came to a screeching halt, after the tracks were put in. Not much future for ethanol, with gas at $1.79 in Detroit area. And not likely to rise much in the next year or two due to the recession, provided we don't engage in any more misguided military adventures in the middle east.
With ethanol plants closing down, maybe the price of corn chips will come back down.

OK. I went to the Liberty site. Thanks. It probably was a good idea, with crude oil at $174 a barrel. But you know what they say about "the best laid plans........." Committing that kind of money based on markets that rise and fall, may not have been such a good idea.

[pbmaxno15]

That would be the southeast corner of Ithaca. In many trips up and down US-127, I have never seen a train on that line.

[AARR]

Unless something has changed a train should go through Ithaca twice a day, almost daily. I think it runs after dark most of the time now.

[hoborich]

Yeah, it is Ithica. Right where the speed limit resumes to 70. There is a crossing right at the curve, where I got some videos of the PM 1225 last summer.