Kentucky Abandoned Rail Corridor Inventory and Assessment

The scope and methodology of the study shall be designed, and shall produce a final product sufficient for the purpose, to allow the Department to fully meet its responsibilities under the provisions of KRS 147A, as follows: The Department for Local Government shall inventory the Commonwealth's active and abandoned rail corridors and, for the abandoned corridors, analyze the suitability of each of those corridors for railtrail conversion. Corridors inventoried shall include both common carrier and private railroads, as well as railroads which may not have been attached to the interstate transportation system. Additionally, corridors over which service has been discontinued as well as corridors potentially subject to abandonment shall be analyzed as abandoned corridors. In conducting the inventory, the department shall, for each corridor, attempt to ascertain the legal ownership status of the corridor and the date rail service over the rail corridor ceased together with the dates of formal abandonment, and make an examination of the physical integrity of the corridor, including the presence or lack of tunnels, bridges, and culverts.