The federal Surface Transportation Board on Friday told Great Lakes Basin Transportation to make public its list of 10 principal stockholders, provide the company's balance sheet and income statement, and make other updates to its application to operate a freight railroad between Northwest Indiana and southeast Wisconsin.
The STB also suspended the termination of public comment period on the application, which was set to expire early next week, and ruled that GLBT must make "highly confidential" material available to in-house counsel for public interest groups that have made legal filings regarding the project.
Regarding the list of principal investors, the STB ruled that "GLBT provides no justification for why the information it seeks to protect — specifically, the shareholders' names and the percentages of GLBT stock held — is 'highly confidential' or even 'confidential.' It does not explain why the information is sensitive or how public disclosure of this infomation could negatively impact GLBT or its principals."
A complete income statement and balance sheet, the STB ruled, "would include revenue, expenses, assets, and liabilities; and based on its application, GLBT has likely incurred liabilities that would be captured in these exhibits."
The STB also ordered several corrections, including listing LaPorte County as among the counties the railroad would serve, an omission from the application.
The ruling served in part as an STB response to filings by groups skeptical of the project, including the Environmental Law & Policy Center, Openlands and the Illinois chapter of the Sierra Club. The organizations also had requested GLBT be required to make public a list of potential customers, but the STB is not requiring that.
The STB directed GLBT to file the list of 10 principal investors by June 9. It gave a June 22 deadline for other information requested.
GLBT founder and managing partner Frank Patton said company officials are reviewing the ruling.
"We are studying the request and we will respond shortly," he said Friday.
The company filed the 77-page application with the STB on May 1. In it, GLBT argued that the shareholder list "contains proprietary and commercially sensitive information and confidential personal information."
The Great Lakes Basin railroad would have 244 miles of mainline track and 17 miles of branch lines, including one connecting with the Chicago South Shore & South Bend Railroad, a freight hauler, at Kingsbury. The Great Lakes Basin would have 26 connections with other railroads along the route, including two in Lake County and six in Porter and LaPorte counties.
The full project would cost an estimated $2.8 billion, according to GLBT's application, though addition of a contingency fund to cover unexpected expenses would increase that.