Watco Companies, Inc. (Watco) and Four Rivers Transportation, Inc. (Four Rivers) announced the sale of the Appalachian and Ohio Railroad (A&O) to Four Rivers of Paducah, Kentucky.

The A&O operates a 158-mile railroad in West Virginia. During the past year Watco had been able to grow the carload business on the line by almost 20%,
with most of that growth being coal moving from West Virginia mines to end users all across the eastern one-third of the United States.