A river, a state line, and three rows that are really two
Chattahoochee is where the Florida panhandle rail line crosses the Apalachicola River at the Georgia line. The Florida Gulf & Atlantic Railroad runs the former CSX panhandle line through it, and AN Railway is the Apalachicola Northern heading south to Port St. Joe.
We hold three rows here and two of them are one place. They lie 0.07 miles apart under the same carrier, and one name is the other with the carrier appended in brackets. What identifies the pair is the agreement of name stem and carrier, not the distance — two genuinely separate yards can sit closer than that.
Traffic at all three was not determined, and we did not verify whether the line is currently operating end to end after Hurricane Michael in 2018. Those are gaps and they are named rather than filled in.
Two rulebooks, one river
So the interesting number here is on the other bank
So the fact worth knowing if you haul out of here has nothing to do with the yards. Georgia starts immediately north, and for the same load it is the more generous state.
Georgia grants forest products a ten per cent variance up to 88,000 lb off the interstate. Florida grants no commodity variance at all. A log truck that crosses the Apalachicola into Georgia enters a more permissive regime carrying exactly what it was carrying a hundred yards earlier.
Florida’s answer is a permit rather than a variance: FDOT may allow ten per cent over legal gross, off the interstate system only, and it does not reach single-unit vehicles at all. So a truck working both banks is under two different instruments in the same day, and only one of them cares what is on the trailer.
Fla. Stat. § 316.550(4), with § 316.535(6). Information, not legal advice, and Georgia’s rules are its own.
Florida paperwork
Which is also true of the paperwork, in a smaller way
Which is also true of the paperwork, though it catches fewer people out. The title question is one sentence: we need one unless the truck is old enough that it never had one.
A lost title has a counter replacement. Where none exists there is a bonded route. Neither is unusual and neither stops a sale.
Florida is an owner-plate state, which is the detail that surprises people: the registration and the licence plate stay in your name, so the plate comes off the truck and is either moved to another vehicle of the same class or surrendered to the county tax collector.
Fla. Stat. § 320.0609(1)(a). Information, not legal advice.
What we buy here
All of it is iron we buy. Log trucks and timber rigs off the woods either side of the Apalachicola, on 88,000 lb Georgia loads and Florida ones alike. Flatbeds and day cabs off the Apalachicola Northern and the panhandle line. Dump trucks, straight trucks, box trucks, rollbacks, service bodies, and the work trucks and pickups that go with a crew.
Whatever you drive, the offer doesn’t change. We buy all of them.
We buy complete trucks. If the engine, transmission, doors, rear ends, drive shafts, wheels or anything under the hood have been removed, we can’t buy it. Small things — a missing bumper — are fine.
Straight answers
The questions we get asked in Chattahoochee
- Does it have to run?No. It does have to be complete — if the engine, transmission, doors, rear ends, drive shafts, wheels or anything under the hood have been removed, we can’t buy it. Rust is not a disqualifier.
- The engine is out of it. Is that different?Yes, and that is the line. A tired engine is fine; an engine that has been pulled out and sold means we can’t buy the truck.
- The truck is titled in Georgia and parked on this side. Does that complicate it?No. Trucks working the Apalachicola Northern end of the county cross that line constantly — the same load is an 88,000 lb load on one bank and is not on the other — and we handle the paperwork either way round.
- What about the title?We need one unless the truck is old enough that it never had one. A lost title has a counter replacement; where none exists there’s a bonded route.
- How do you pay?Cash or electronic payment, whichever suits you.
Why people call
Beyond a truck that has simply done its turns, the reasons are personal ones. Retiring. A medical that went the wrong way. A woods job that finished on the Apalachicola Northern end of the county and left one truck spare, a hundred yards from the 88,000 lb it would have been allowed on the far bank.
Most of those aren’t happy reasons, and we don’t treat them like they are. Somebody wants a straight answer and the truck gone by the end of the week. That’s what we’re here for.