(Spirit Lake)– The Dickinson county board of supervisors Tuesday unanimously approved a purchase agreement between the Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation and the General Railway Corporation, or Iowa Northwestern Railroad, to purchase the railroad right-of-way from just west of Superior to near Allendorff in Osceola county.
Terms of the deal include an agreement by Dickinson and Osceola counties to re-purchase the right-of-way from the Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation at a later time through grants and other means.
Steve Litts of the Dickinson County Trails Board told the supervisors the right-of-way was appraised at slightly more than 1.2 million dollars and the purchase price is 855,126-dollars. Litts says they applied for two grants–one in July for 525-thousand dollars; another in October for 331,026-dollars.
Litts says just exactly when the trail construction along the rail right-of-way would begin and be completed isn’t known yet. He says a seven mile segment of rail from just east of Spirit Lake to just west of Superior as the current owner has a five-year agreement in place with another company to store rail cars in that area. Litts says that portion of the line will revert over once that expires.
Litts says the purchase represents a significant milestone for the trails group. He says it’s something they’ve been working on periodically for years.
