Railroad vet Marlon Taylor named president of New York & Atlantic Railway

Marlon Taylor, a 25-year veteran of the railroad business, has been named president of the New York & Atlantic Railway, Long Island’s main provider of freight goods by rail.

Taylor, 50, of Lynbrook, stepped into the role earlier this week, succeeding James Bonner, who ran the goods-shipping business since 2016. The business, which operates along 269 miles of track servicing the Island, Queens and Brooklyn, is owned by parent company Anacostia Rail Holdings, of Chicago.

“Marlon has become an integral part of the NYA team since he joined the railroad in 2016,” Bruce A. Lieberman, Anacostia executive vice president and chief financial officer, said in a statement.

“We could not have had a better candidate to continue building on the success of NYA,” Lieberman said. “The railroad is in its best-ever financial and physical condition, and it fields a team of unmatched professional railroaders.”

Taylor began his career in the rail industry in 1999 with the Pacific Harbor Line in Wilmington, California, a sister freight business of NYA also owned by Anacostia. One of his earliest jobs with the railroad was serving as a conductor driving freight trains, he said.

He rose through the ranks until leaving Pacific Harbor in 2016 as director of operations. Taylor started as assistant vice president of the local rail company that same year.

“My goal is not to upset the applecart,” Taylor said. “We’ve done a lot of good things, and my job is to continue that trend of growth, safety and service.”

Among his biggest goals for NYA is to educate the public on the advantages of rail freight over trucks, he said.

“It starts with education and awareness,” he said. “How do we get more people informed about what we provide in terms of environmental and traffic benefits?”

Rail-delivered freight takes gas-burning trucks off the road, reducing emissions, Taylor said, and is also more efficient at moving bulk goods like rice, grain and gravel. 

The New York & Atlantic Railway, which took over freight operations from the Long Island Rail Road in 1997, started by shipping around 10,000 carloads of goods a year on and off the Island. The company now ships an average of 32,000 carloads each year and has seen a growth rate of about 5% a year.

Local customers of NYA include Winters Bros., Gershow Recycling and Paraco Gas. 

Every train carload hauled by New York & Atlantic holds about four trucks’ worth of goods, according to Washington, D.C.-based Association of American Railroads. On average, the railway cuts roughly 128,000 truck trips from major highways per year, according to NYA. 

“We’ll continue to do good work and be a good steward,” Taylor said.