Welcome!

The NWA Rail Crossing Study (Northwest Arkansas Rail Corridor Safety Study) aims to identify practical safety improvements at eight railroad crossings along a 14-mile section of the Arkansas & Missouri Railroad (AMRR) in Fayetteville and Springdale, Arkansas.

Funded by the Railroad Crossing Elimination Program, with the City of Fayetteville as the primary contact, the study area includes the eight crossings and neighboring properties, roads, sidewalks, trails, and other infrastructure. The included crossings are listed below and shown on a map.


The team needs your feedback!

Engagement will occur throughout the study, allowing the team to gather information and have community conversations at relevant points in the timeline. The purpose of engagement is to gain insight into stakeholder priorities and concerns related to the existing crossings.

How you can get involved:

    1. Visit individual crossing pages to share insight
    2. Take the mini survey for crossings you interact with regularly
    3. Attend a public open house - see the events calendar
    4. Revisit this site for updates throughout the project
      • We'll have suggested improvements available to review in Fall 2025

  • Purpose of the Study

    The goal of this study is to find practical ways to enhance safety, mobility, community connectivity, emergency access, economic benefits, transit connections, and resilience at the eight crossings.

  • Potential Improvements

    Potential recommendations could include:

    • Improving safety features: Adding or upgrading elements like lights, signs, or barriers.
    • Providing grade separations: Creating overpasses or underpasses so that roads and railways don't intersect at the same level.
    • Closing crossings: Shutting down the crossing to reduce the risk of accidents.

  • Included Crossings

    There are eight (8) crossings being reviewed as a part of the study in Springdale and Fayetteville. See the map below and click on the crossing for more information and to take you to the crossing page where you can share feedback.

Study Area and Crossings

Click on the "i" information icons on the map below or use the main website navigation to select specific crossings to learn more and share feedback.

  • Apple Blossom Avenue (Springdale)
  • Randall Wobbe Drive (Springdale)
  • Sunset Avenue (Springdale)
  • Shady Grove Road (Springdale)
  • Jocelyn Lane (Fayetteville)
  • Frisco Avenue (Fayetteville)
  • Dickson Street (Fayetteville)
  • University Avenue (Fayetteville)

Any crossing not listed is not a part of the study and the study team is unable to address. If you have concerns about a crossing not listed, please reach out to the corresponding city.

Click on each icon on the map to view a short description of the crossing. Follow the link to view more information and share your feedback on specific locations.

Aerial map of the study area and included crossings in Springdale and Fayetteville

Study FAQ

The City of Fayetteville, in coordination with the City of Springdale and AMRR, applied for and received a Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 Railroad Crossing Elimination (RCE) grant to conduct a study to identify reasonable solutions to improve safety at eight (8) at-grade crossings along a 14-mile corridor.

The goal of this study is to find practical ways to make the eight crossings safer. Potential recommendations could include:

  • Improving safety features: Adding or upgrading elements like lights, signs, or barriers.
  • Providing grade separations: Creating overpasses or underpasses so that roads and railways don't intersect at the same level.
  • Closing crossings: Shutting down the crossing to reduce the risk of accidents.

The locations for the grant funding were chosen based on coordination with the Cities of Fayetteville and Springdale, and AMRR. These railroad crossings have Hazard Ratings up to 10.63, intersecting with some of the busier roads in Northwest Arkansas. Hazard Ratings are used by ARDOT to prioritize railroad grade crossing safety projects as part of their Section 130 Railway-Highway Crossings Program. The ratings are index values that incorporate average daily traffic (ADT), trains per day, number of train tracks, and number of crashes within the last 15 years. Higher values show great need for safety improvements or elimination of the crossing.

No funds have been identified to construct improvements at any of the crossing locations. Once completed, this study will be used as a planning guide for future improvements.

Stakeholder engagement will occur throughout the study and aims to gain insight into priorities regarding safety and mobility, community connectivity, medical and emergency service access, economic and community benefits, intersecting transit connections, resiliency, or other concerns related to the existing crossings.

AMRR is a short line Class III railroad servicing the Southwest Missouri and Northwest Arkansas regions in the transport of goods such as paper products, steel, lumber, grain and feed supplements, and sand for concrete manufacturing. AMRR also provides passenger excursions in the Northwest Arkansas between the Cities of Springdale and Van Buren. The railroad runs generally in the north-south direction from Monett, Missouri to Fort Smith, Arkansas, connecting manufacturing communities to multimodal freight commodities such as rock, sand, gravel, chemical fertilizers, and various food products traveling up the Arkansas River.


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