OMAHA — Union Pacific Railroad Co., after five contentious years of searching for a spot to build a new truck and rail facility in the Chicago area, can breathe a sigh of relief, the Omaha World-Herald reports.
The Omaha-based rail giant celebrated a groundbreaking on a $181 million, 1,200-acre facility in Rochelle, Ill. At the Global III Intermodal Facility, freight will be loaded and unloaded from trains to an expected 350,000 trucks annually.
The project is seen as a key in U.P.’s market-share battle with Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. Union Pacific’s five existing Chicago-area railports are at capacity, and demand to move Pacific Rim goods from West Coast ports to the Midwest is growing.
Construction on the new U.P. railport began in late 2001, and the facility is expected to be completed by July 2003.
The project is a good fit for both Union Pacific and Rochelle, a town of 9,500 that is 75 miles west of Chicago. Union Pacific needed a location near Chicago, and Rochelle city leaders welcomed the new jobs and growth the project would bring.
Joe Salitros, Rochelle city manager, said the new facility is expected to provide 350 jobs in a city where the local economy relies heavily on agriculture and manufacturing.
“There is a main line of Union Pacific and of the Burlington Northern that cross in the city,” he said. “We are known as the ‘Hub City.'”
For U.P., the Rochelle intermodal facility will help the company compete. In the rail business, all roads lead to Chicago. It’s a major hub and transfer point for trains moving shipments to other locations across North America.
Chicago is the home to 21 railports, including U.P.’s Rochelle facility and a railport in Joliet, Ill., operated by Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad. That facility also is currently under construction.
“There’s a large domestic market here because 40 percent of the U.S. population is within 500 miles,” said Gerald Rawling, director of operations analysis for the Chicago Area Transportation Study. “Intermodal volume is expected to double in the next 10 years or so.”
At U.P.’s groundbreaking event, Union Pacific Railroad President and Chief Operating Officer Ike Evans, along with Rochelle city and Illinois state officials, took turns driving in a 3-foot-long decorative golden spike to mark the construction of the facility.
It also will mark the end of much public antagonism that had followed the railroad since it began its search for a location for a new railport in 1997.
Before deciding upon Rochelle in the fall of 2000, Union Pacific looked at several sites:
* Five hundred acres of property near DuPage Airport, which is 30 miles from downtown Chicago.
* The city of Maple Park, which is 60 miles west of Chicago.
However, opposition from residents of rural western Illinois towns concerned about the truck traffic and objections from some politicians, including U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., thwarted U.P.’s plans for those two cities.
U.P. spokesman John Bromley said the company even looked at land on the outskirts of the Chicago metropolitan area, but there wasn’t enough available property.
Bromley said U.P. picked Rochelle for two reasons: the city welcomed U.P., and it was situated at the crossroads of Interstates 88 and 39, allowing for good highway access.
Rochelle’s city manager, Salitros, said U.P. received low-interest loans to build the rail line serving the railport. The City of Rochelle is providing infrastructure, such as water, roads, sewer and electricity.