Business View Magazine - September 2015

58 Business View - September 2015 Business View - September 2015 59 increased traffic between its port facilities and the rail- roads that served them. Jeff McWhorter, the President and CEO of today’s Pal- metto Railways, picks up the narrative: “We originally started with the Port Utilities Commission of Charles- ton and the Port Terminal Railroad [two rail lines] which were owned and operated by the Port. In 1969, the Legislature decided to spin off the rail operations from the Port Authority and they created the South Caro- lina Public Railways Commission. Later, as a part of an economic development effort in the ‘70s, we acquired property and built a 15-mile railroad that we called the East Cooper & Berkeley Railroad that was specifically built for Amoco Chemical Company (now BP Chemical) to locate here in South Carolina. We later built another mile and a half to two miles off of that for Nucor Steel in the early ‘90s. “Under a restructuring of government that occurred in the early ‘90s, the Commission was abolished and we were rolled into the newly-created Department of Com- merce and that’s where we remain, today, as a division of the Department of Commerce. We operated three different railroad companies – East Cooper & Berke- ley (ECBR), the Port Utilities Commission of Charles- Palmetto Railways Storied railroad company travels a straight track in south carolina Everyone agrees that a railroad train needs to run in a straight line in order to achieve its maximum speed, safety, and efficiency; too many curves in the track ahead and the engineer has to slow down or risk jump- ing the rails and causing a locomotive disaster. And yet, the saga of South Carolina’s Palmetto Railways has more twists and turns in its long history than a bent corkscrew, a Bavarian pretzel, and a giant roller coaster ride, all rolled into one. The genealogy of today’s state-owned rail company, a division of the South Carolina Department of Com- merce, goes back over a hundred years, when the East Shore Terminal Company operated a Southeastern railroad that served North and South Carolina in the late 1800s. In 1903, after the company had expanded along the Charleston, South Carolina Harbor water- front, its franchise and assets were transferred to the Charleston Terminal Company. Some two decades lat- er, the Public Utilities Commission of Charleston took over the railroad’s operations. In 1942, the State of South Carolina created the South Carolina State Ports Authority, and once again, the railroad’s ownership changed, as the State came in to try and monitor the AT A GLANCE WHO: Palmetto Railways WHAT: A division of the South Carolina Department of Commerce, Palmetto Railways operates three rail- road subdivisions WHERE: Headquarters in Charleston, SC WEBSITE : www.palmettorailways.com logistics logistics