Pittsburgh-based L.B. Foster Co. began delivery of $3.4 million of rail and trackwork products to rail contractor Wintrow Construction of Barberton, Ohio, for the construction of 8.5 miles of track and other track materials at the new Vallourec & Mannesmann Tubes Star Steel pipe mill in Youngstown, Ohio.

L.B. Foster teamed with key strategic partners to meet the product requirements for track construction at this important industrial facility. The new 115# continuous welded rail (CWR) is produced by Steel Dynamics Inc. (SDI) in their Columbia City, Ind., facility. SDI welded 240-foot rail sections into 1,600-foot strings and loaded them onto a special L.B. Foster work train for delivery to the Ohio project site. The company's team of rail professionals is managing the logistics required to provide efficient "just-in-time delivery" of the rail and trackwork materials to the jobsite.

The new rail, trackwork and rail accessories supplied by L.B. Foster will provide mainline access and in-plant transportation for seamless steel pipe at the new Youngstown mill. Vallourec & Mannesmann is building the facility to meet the growing demand for small diameter oil country tubular goods resulting from the increase in drilling for natural gas in the nearby Marcellus Shale region.