Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

NATCHEZ – More than $7.7 million in federal dollars will help fund improvements to the Natchez Railway, the only east-west railway serving rural Southwest Mississippi.

U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., announced more than $170 million in funding from the Department of Transportation for bridge and railway projects in Mississippi. Among those is the $7,734,717 to create new rail connections to shippers and improve the safety and performance of rail shipments along the Natchez Railway.

The critical railroad line into Natchez faced abandonment in 2009 until Natchez Inc., private business leaders and county and city officials convinced the rail line’s owners it was possible to make money from it instead. A $16 million public-private project to rehabilitate that railroad line, which is considered “the gold standard” of short-line railways, was completed in March 2022.

“I was glad to support these projects. They will help create jobs, keep freight deliveries on time, and boost economic development. These rail lines will help keep Mississippi moving,” Wicker said in a statement.