On Monday (June 22, 2026), CSX Transportation and leaders from the Maryland State Government and Port of Baltimore celebrated completion of modifications to the Howard Street Tunnel in Baltimore City, as well as several related projects in Pennsylvania, Delaware, and elsewhere in Maryland to permit double-stack trains to serve the Port of Baltimore.
For decades, Port officials and Maryland politicians wanted to move double stack rail traffic to-and-from the Port. Doing so would complement the facility's advantage of being the closest East Coast port to the Midwest, and push back on the disadvantage it carries: the need for ships serving it to travel either through the C&D Canal or go back south out of the Chesapeake Bay and around the Eastern Shore of Maryland in order to reach points further north, including Philadelphia and New York.
This project lowered the track in the tunnel by 18 inches and included a substantial reconstruction of the rail infrastructure both to and within the tunnel, which gained infamy through a 6-day fire following a 2001 train derailment. The tunnel also was once electrified by original owner Baltimore & Ohio and served as a conduit for that carrier's passenger trains during the era when its Royal Blue and other services competed with the Pennsylvania in the New York-Washington market.
You can see photos from the event through CSX's Instagram post here: CSX 6/23/26 Port of Baltimore Instagram Post
Featured Image: A former L&N SD40-2 at the Port of Baltimore during May of 2020. Photo Credit: Phil Bell