When he’s not working in his official capacity as Fredericksburg’s vice mayor, Chuck Frye delivers packages for UPS.
But Frye took a moment during Tuesday’s city council meeting to offer his services as a realtor.
“I wish your CEO would buy one of those houses on Railroad Avenue and move their family in there,” Frye (Ward 4) told Randy Marcus, the CSX Transportation director of state relations who attended Tuesday’s meeting to give an update on the rail company’s efforts to investigate and address the issues that led to the July derailment of five train cars near the Cobblestone Square apartments.
“Move in there and see how it feels to live there and see how it feels to watch that going on directly in front of their family.”
Similar sentiments resounded during councilors’ pointed questioning of Marcus, who detailed one major change the rail company is making as the result of its investigation.
A new derail device was installed approximately 10 days after the derailment, said Marcus, away from any residential developments or private property south of the State Route 3 overpass near the CSX railyard.
Until a new signalized switch can be installed and integrated into CSX’s system, the former derail device near Cobblestone has been covered with “a large rock pile,” Marcus said.
“There’s no way anything can get off the tracks and impact the community there,” he added.
Marcus said that CSX engineers did analyze the sound wall when it was constructed 20 years ago but apparently didn’t find any problems with the proximity.
“We absolutely should’ve realized that the derail device was too close to the sound wall,” he said.
Mayor Kerry Devine asked Marcus whether CSX would support a separate, independent investigation into the derailment by the Federal Railway Administration (FRA), a step championed last week by Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-7th).
“We will comply with that investigation,” Marcus said.
That answer did not satisfy Councilor Jon Gerlach (Ward 2), who noted rather forcefully that CSX is legally obligated to respond to and comply with such an investigation.
“You dodged the question,” Gerlach said. “Will you support — proactively — Congresswoman Spanberger’s request for an additional investigation?”
“That’s not my position to say whether additional inquiry is needed,” Marcus replied. “We feel like we’ve identified the issues and addressed the issues internally.”
“So the answer is ‘no,’ thank you,” Gerlach said.
City hopes to ‘stay in the game’ for data center
Mayor Kerry Devine is an avid sports fan, a background that informed her framing of the city’s ongoing pursuit of a data center.
“Taking this step doesn’t commit us to anything, but it does keep us in the game,” Devine said Tuesday night of partnering with the city’s Economic Development Authority to fund a $200,000 feasibility study, to be carried out by Dominion Energy. “Without staying in the game right now, we forfeit. We’re not part of those discussions moving forward.”
A few hours earlier, during the city council work session, EDA chair Beth Black suggested that her board would be willing to fund the study completely out of its own budget, which doesn’t draw from taxpayer dollars.
“It would hurt, but we believe it’s the best thing for the community at this time,” Black said in response to a question from Gerlach about how using EDA funds would affect its ability to pursue other economic initiatives.
Fredericksburg Regional Alliance President Curry Roberts told councilors that data centers have become core infrastructure in our communities and should be viewed as such. He cited a recent report from Parks Associates that found the average American household has an average of 16 internet-connected devices.
“They’re not a nice thing to have anymore,” said Roberts, “we have to have them.”
Roberts also said that Dominion informed major data center developers and local electric cooperatives that the timeframe from entering the engineering stage to completing a project — “flipping the switch” — has stretched to seven years as the queue for such projects lengthens.
“I think what we’re focused on is taking that next step,” Devine said.
Not everyone shared the mayor’s rooting interest, however. During public comment, several citizens spoke out either in opposition to a data center — or to what they see as the perceived briskness with which the process is moving forward.
City resident Eric Bonds urged councilors to find “a different kind of economic development” that doesn’t exacerbate climate change.
“The runaway development of data centers that we’re seeing just is not consistent with a safe and stable climate that we all want our children and grandchildren to enjoy,” Bonds said.
Councilor Tim Duffy (Ward 3) relayed the overarching sentiment from a recent meeting of the Clean and Green Commission, on which he sits as a commissioner.
“There is definitely a worry in the city that it doesn’t jive with what our climate goals are, using all of this energy,” Duffy said.
