BANGOR DAILY NEWS • January 15, 2022
This week Maine potatoes have left Aroostook County on rail cars, bound for big markets, for the first time in more than 40 years. The 2021 harvest made history for its size — a roughly 20 percent greater yield than normal, thanks to near-perfect growing conditions. But what to do with all the extra spuds, and how to get them to market in the middle of a trucking shortage. Enter the Loring Development Authority, which offered the use of some unused buildings on the former Loring Air Force Base in Limestone — gratefully accepted by a few local growers who were out of storage options. Some of the potatoes are being moved to Pan Am Railways in Massachusetts, then on to CSX (Canadian Pacific) and then to Union Pacific, bound for Washington state.