MANSFIELD — The Main Street railroad crossing has been a tire-busting gateway into Mansfield’s north side for a long time.
Norfolk Southern has finally addressed it by repaving its portion of the crossing, work that began April 2 and is nearing completion.
Main Street has been closed in both directions while the work is underway.
City engineer Bob Bianchi said Thursday he was happy to see the freight carrier finally fix the crossing — especially since the city had no authority or ability to do anything on the NS right-of-way.
“The city received a myriad of phone calls about that section of pavement that is not maintained by the city,” he said. “We don’t have a right to maintain it even if wanted to do so.”
Bianchi said it took a concerted effort during the last year to get Norfolk Southern to take action, including resident complaints filed with the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio.
“They are just very difficult to work with,” Bianchi said. “It’s very difficult to get them to act in a timely manner to fix their pavement. We are not allowed into their right-of-way, so we could not fix it.
“I hope they are making more of a permanent fix as opposed to just another band-aid,” the engineer said.
“It was just very frustrating from our end that we couldn’t do anything about it and had to solely rely on Norfolk Southern to act on its own volition,” he said. “Our hands were tied.”
The engineer is still hopeful a “grade separation” could be done over the major railroad crossing in the years ahead.
Motorists entering and exiting the city on Main Street/Ohio 13 often complain about stuck at the crossing for extended periods of time.
“The trains have to slow down (entering the crossing) because they are entering an urban area. So it takes longer for trains to move through the intersection,” he said.
The bridge-like project would be similar to the one done on Illinois Avenue in Madison Township many years ago.
The city worked with the Columbus firm of EMH&T in 2021 for a study of impacts and costs over all of the Norfolk Southern/Ashland rail lines just south of U.S. 30.
EMH&T’s preliminary opinion on construction costs for such a project was $18.7 million in 2026, an estimate that included $2.7 million in unexpected contingency costs and $2.1 million in increased prices due to inflation.
“Multiple grants would have to be obtained for the project,” Bianchi said. “It’s something we are looking at.”
