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Texas Gulf Coast refineries.
• An earlier proposed route drew fierce opposition because landowners said it would threaten the Nebraska Sandhills, a region of grass-covered dunes used as ranchland. That prompted the state Legislature to pass a law in 2012 giving Gov. Dave Heineman the authority to approve the route. The new one he approved goes around an area designated as the Sandhills, although opponents insist it still traverses the delicate soil.
• The other states along the pipeline's route -- Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas -- have already approved their segments. Oil is already flowing through the Oklahoma-to-Texas segment.
• TransCanada officials have said passing through Nebraska is the most direct, practical way to transport the oil. And rerouting the pipeline would bring new states into the mix and would lead to further expensive delays.
• For the Nebraska Public Service Commission to act, state lawmakers may have to pass a new pipeline-sitting law. Staff members were still reviewing the ruling Wednesday, said Angela Melton, the commission's attorney.
• The landowners believe they may have a better chance at blocking the pipeline if it's the commission that must approve the route, though the panel's five members haven't given an indication as to how they might rule. The commission was created in 1890s to prevent governors from granting political favors to railroad executives who wanted to expand through private property, and its members are elected on a regional basis.
• Randy Thompson, a Nebraska rancher and a leading plaintiff in the lawsuit, became involved in the dispute after he was notified that the original Keystone XL route would have crossed his parents' 400-acre farm in Merrick County. He said he doesn't think TransCanada should be able to force landowners to sign pipeline contracts using eminent domain.
• "They came out here like a bunch of bullies and tried to force it down our throats," Thompson said. "They told us there was nothing we could do to stop it."
• Meanwhile, the decision on a federal permit for the northern leg of the route still rests with Obama, five years after backers first asked his administration for approval.
• Obama blocked the Keystone XL pipeline in January 2012, saying he did not have enough time for a fair review before a looming deadline forced on him by congressional Republicans. But late last month, the U.S. State Department last month released an environmental analysis that raised no major environmental objections to the $7 billion pipeline, though opponents disagree.
• U.S. State Department spokesman Douglas Frantz said officials were aware of

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