Black Mesa and Lake Powell Railroad 1694a

Driving along US 160 northeast of Tuba City, AZ, one comes upon a startling sight -- an electric railway line. While electric rail lines are common in the Northeast, I don't recall ever seeing one in the West or in as rural an area as this. Given that electric rail is not used in the West, the existence of an electric rail line was quite mystifying. On further investigation it turned out that this is a rail line that runs only between a coal-fired generating plant near Lake Powell and the Black Mesa coal mine near Kayenta, AZ.

The generating plant itself has been a point of contention for many years due to the pollution and haze it causes near the Grand Canyon and over an area of the West that is otherwise pristine, and its impact on water quality for the Native American tribes in the area. The electricity generated by the plant is or was sold to major urban areas in the west, including Las Vegas and Los Angeles, thus the plant and related pollution could be interpreted as urban areas exporting their pollution.