May 7, 2024, marked a significant event for Dolese: for the first time, we loaded rail cars with limestone from our Big Canyon quarry and shipped them to Fort Worth Materials. Completing the construction project to link these two locations opens further growth opportunities for us.

The North Texas Market

Completing a second rail spur at Fort Worth Materials and opening Big Canyon means we’ll now serve the fast-growing north Texas market with both sand from White Eagle and stone from Big Canyon.

“We’re getting our foot in the door with the north Texas market and looking to the future. There are lots of possibilities—does this open the door for other Dolese sites in Texas? Can we ship our product even further into Texas? We don’t know yet, but this is an opportunity to find out,” said Bryce Coffman, General Manager - Southwest Oklahoma Aggregate Operations & Maintenance. “It’s exciting to now have new communities to build and support.”

Big Canyon’s primary customers will be ready-mix concrete providers in North Texas. 

Shipping by Rail

A rail spur is a secondary railway line that branches off a main rail line to provide access to a business or town not located on the main line. Railroad guidelines require that spurs be designed to be completely independent of the main lines so that they don’t interfere with train operations. For the Big Canyon and Fort Worth Materials spurs, we needed to purchase enough land to park a 6,600-foot, 120-car train to meet this requirement.

Although construction of the rail spur at Big Canyon and Fort Worth Materials had many challenges, it also brings opportunities to ship our products further and positions us as a growing competitor in markets outside Oklahoma. 

“We’re now set up with four places to land trains – Richards Spur, White Eagle, Fort Worth Materials and Big Canyon,” said Cory Shreffler, Director of Engineering and Richards Spur. “With trains on our network, we can strategically serve markets outside of Oklahoma and give customers an opportunity to get materials from somewhere they otherwise wouldn’t have traveled.”

Cory added that, going through the construction process, we acquired further knowledge about rail construction, and we’re currently training employees in railroad operations. 

What’s Next

There’s still work to be done as we test the new equipment at both locations, train employees, and generate sales. However, the opportunities are exciting as we create the future in a new market and inspire innovation among our employees.