How can a railroad cause a flood?

The answer is, it can't. But that's what the media and city officials of Lumberton, NC, are saying, and they're pointing the proverbial finger at the railroad, CSX. Do they have a good argument?

A little history is in order. In October 2016, Hurricane Matthew caused widespread flooding around North Carolina's inner banks. This included Lumberton. They have a levee, but this levee is breached by a CSX underpass that intersects with Interstate 95 in the area. Floodwaters poured through the underpass and flooded the town. It happened again with Hurricane Florence, and the good people of Lumberton knew it would.

Railway Age reports that city fathers have wanted a floodgate for the underpass "for years." It's not clear how long "years" is, except that it is at least since Matthew. The report implies that CSX resisted this, but it may be that city fathers just dragged their feet in getting around to finding the funds to build it.

Given the turmoil at CSX over the past year, and the attitude that the railroad has shown to other cities that expected it to live up to its promises (please Google 'Baltimore Howard Street Tunnel'), it is probable that CSX did not want to participate or have its service disrupted by construction of the floodgate. However, once CSX began to do serious foot-dragging, one would think the Lumberton people would get on the problem on their own.

Of course, CSX made itself a bigger target for blame by also refusing the city permission to sandbag and/or otherwise obstruct the CSX line to prevent flooding once it was clear a hit by Florence was imminent. One of the excuses given by CSX is reportedly it would damage the track and roadbed. Oh, come on! What would the imminent flood do anyway?? It eventually took an order by the state governor. Really? With a property damage disaster imminent CSX had to be ordered to allow preventative measures on its property?

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