A total of 410 railroad air-dump ballast cars carrying 14,350 cubic yards of sub-ballast has been unloaded on the Bestwall spur, south of Marysville, Kansas, since the work started in March.

George Brown, UP work train coordinator, said UP hopes to have unloading done by the end of June.

The sub-ballast will be used beneath where room for eight sets of bypass tracks will be laid as part of the $45 million grade separation, flood control and railroad relocation project.

Unloading of the 70-car trains started in March at the west and south sides of town where the former Kramer Oil fueling station was and near Spring Creek. Crews earlier worked to clear the area for the trains.

Sub-ballast is a 6-inch layer of gravel that will be put over a sub-grade. Eventually 12 to 13 miles of main and yard train track will be laid on top. The sub-ballast, the finest of granite, is a by-product of crushed granate.

The sub-ballast is brought in from Granite, Wyo., west of Cheyenne.

On top of the sub-ballast workers will put drains, track and ballast. Tracks will be raised up through the ballast.

"It takes about five minutes to unload a car, and four to five hours to unload a train," said Brown.

Two track hoes from Saginaw Construction, Topeka, are used to unload. On off days, when they are not unloading sub-ballast, track hoes are used to move the sub-ballast away from the unloading area to a place where there will eventually be a one- to two-story-high pile of sub-ballast.

Two engines pull the work train, which travels about 35 miles an hour. It takes around 24 hours to get here from Cheyenne.

"The two work trains cycle back in three days, if we hit the pit right to load the ballast," Brown said.

Lance George, manager of special projects for UP, said the project is on schedule and the railroad relocation work could be finished in the middle of 2005.