Powered by St. Louis innovation, the Columbia Terminal Railroad will deploy autonomous, self-propelled railcars to serve Mid-Missouri business hub
Self-propelled, autonomous railcars will soon run in Missouri between Columbia and Centralia on the Columbia Terminal Railroad – the first time this technology will be deployed on a regulated short line in the nation – after the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Railroad Administration announced a $16.2 million grant to modernize the 21.4-mile COLT railroad.
To find a technology partner for this cutting-edge project, the FRA needed to look no further than elsewhere in Missouri: St. Louis-based Intramotev, which builds battery-powered autonomous freight railcars, will deploy its TugVolt railcars, which on the COLT railroad will begin with remote switching and build to autonomous freight service across the full mainline, pending approval of an FRA test program…