Chisholm Trail Terminal brings value back to producers

As the first locomotives and railways started popping up in the 1800s, the Chisholm Trail was also being used in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas to aid in transporting goods from one trading post to the next. Trains might seem like a thing of the past, but in the case of grain terminals, if it is not broke, there is no reason to fix it. A grain terminal is a large grain elevator with the capacity to ship grain by rail or barge to foreign and domestic markets. The Chisholm Trail Terminal, located in Medford, Oklahoma, is a cooperatively owned facility and has been shipping grain by rail since 2016. “If you look at most other terminals, those are owned by large private companies,” said Alan Woodard, CEO of Comark Equity Alliance. “Since the CTT is cooperatively owned, it brings the profitability associated with operating this facility one step closer to the farmer.” Farmer’s Grain Cooperative owns 60 percent of the terminal while CEA owns 40 percent. It has a loop track with concrete upright structures and high speed loading capacity for loading and receiving grain. The CTT has about 1.8 million bushels of upright storage and 2 million bushels of bunker storage. In addition, there is a 10,000-ton dry fertilizer shed that can receive product by rail. The CTT is ranked as one of the highest commodity wheat shippers on the Union Pacific Railway. Woodard says a typical railcar will hold between 3,700 to 3,800 bushels of wheat. Trains usually have 110 cars and carry about 420,000 bushels of grain. A semi-truck can hold between 900 to 950 bushels, which means one train leaving the terminal equates to about 440 plus semi loads of grain in one trip...MORE