By ROBBY GAL Staff Writer | Casa Grande Dispatch
COOLIDGE — Western Pinal County is a step closer to having a major inland port with significant cargo moving opportunities projected.
Coolidge Public Works Director Susanna Struble said the city was approached by county staff and Pinal Land Holdings about assisting with the application for a federal grant for roadway improvements to Houser and Hanna roads.
The Coolidge City Council approved assisting with the application for the federal grant on April 11.
“They have asked us to be in support to move forward with the submittal of an application to help with the improvements on Hanna Road and Houser Road as it goes over the railroad down there and as it attaches to State Route 87,” Struble said. “This is a daunting task to go after this application.”
The detailed application asks various questions pertaining to the project.
The project, called Inland Port Arizona and Pinal Logistics Park, represents a regional opportunity for economic development and job growth. The project consists of approximately 1,636 acres within the city limits of Coolidge.
The project is located within five miles of Interstate 10 and within 10 miles of Interstate 8 and is contiguous to State Route 87 and the Union Pacific Railroad, which provides access to central Phoenix.
A consultant, Tim Wolfe, project engineer for Dibble Engineering, was hired by the county to help with submission of the application and explained what the next steps are.
“Congress passed what is known as the (Fixing America’s Surface Transportation) FAST Act, which provided for a grant program much like the TIGER grants,” Wolfe said.
“It will involve opportunities to improve shipping ports, borders as well as inland ports,” Wolfe said. “IPAZ does meet the requirements for this and would provide an opportunity for a development down at Hanna Road to Houser Road.”
Wolfe said his firm has been working with Pinal Land Holdings, of which Jackob Andersen is president, on the project and the application.
The park is on the eastern edge of a proposed 58-mile highway called the North South Freeway, under study by the Arizona Department of Transportation. The North-South Freeway would extend from U.S. 60 in eastern Maricopa County through central Pinal County and eventually connect to I-10 near Eloy.
Wolfe explained that at the ports in California when shipping comes in, the ships get unloaded and the cargo goes onto a truck. And because they are right at the coast it is often congested.
“By instead loading those on rail and shipping them to an inland port, they can then off-load and then put those on trucks and not have problems with congestion, safety and a lot of those aspects,” Wolfe said. “This particular inland port would be in Coolidge, Arizona, instead of in California.”
It would allow the movement of roughly 14,000 cargo trainloads per year according to Wolfe, with an opportunity to expand that to 100,000 in the long term.
The project proposes a $9.9 million federal contribution, with a match of another $6.5 million in local contributions, consisting of a combination of Pinal Land Holdings contributing $5.1 million and Pinal County contributing another $1.5 million.
There is no matching contribution from Coolidge as part of the application.
The project would consist of improvements to SR 87 and road improvement crossings of the railroad at Hanna and Houser Roads.
