(Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News circulated the following story by Tim Steller of the Arizona Daily Star on March 16.)
TUCSON, Ariz. — Union Pacific plans to begin transferring shipping containers between rail cars and trucks in Tucson next month — a boost for the region’s effort to become a cross-border commerce center. The opening next month of this “intermodal” trade hub, scheduled for April 19, allows Tucson to sell itself as a distribution center for commerce between California, Mexico and the Eastern United States, Mayor Bob Walkup said.
“To me, this is a statement from UP (Union Pacific) that they have confidence in Tucson,” Walkup said.
At the hub, containers filled with goods will arrive by truck or train, perhaps be stored for a time, and then be reloaded onto another truck or train for shipment to stores, factories or assembly plants.
The rail line will use tracks, warehouses and roads built at the Port of Tucson property near South Kolb Road and Interstate 10, a private development by Alan Levin and his family. They began working on the idea in 1997 and have installed $1.6 million worth of rails and other infrastructure to accommodate Union Pacific, Levin said.
The last time Tucson had such an “intermodal” center was 1998. Union Pacific inherited the facility, in the switchyard alongside Barraza Aviation Parkway, from Southern Pacific after the two companies merged in 1996, said Union Pacific spokesman John Bromley.
“It was a very low volume, and we closed that shortly after the merger,” Bromley said.
All that was before Levin built the Century Park Research Center and its million square feet of warehouse space. The center includes the Port of Tucson.
Although the intermodal hub is private, local officials view it as an important piece of a bigger effort. They have been pushing the concept of “Puerto Nuevo,” a commercial hub centered on the Tucson’s Southeast Side, including the University of Arizona Science and Technology Park, Tucson International Airport and other facilities.
The idea is that companies will want to take advantage of Tucson’s location along transportation arteries running east-to-west in the United States as well as stretching south into Mexico and north as far as Canada.
That would mean more jobs in warehousing, logistics and possibly manufacturing, Walkup said. For example, he said, the city is trying to attract suppliers for Ford Motor Co., which is making a massive new investment at its plant in Hermosillo, Sonora, about 230 miles south of Tucson.
The intermodal hub could also eventually handle containers shipped into the seaport of Guaymas, Sonora, another 90 miles south of Hermosillo. Mexican President Vicente Fox decreed last year that containers crossing into Mexico at Nogales and traveling to Guaymas need not undergo customs inspections.
But before businesses take advantage of that, the Mexican rail company Ferromex must upgrade its operations south of the border to allow the line to handle flatbed rail cars that accommodate large containers.
Bromley said Union Pacific plans to keep open its intermodal hub in Phoenix, just east of the Bank One Ballpark. But that is on a spur line, an offshoot of the main line, whereas the Port of Tucson is on Union Pacific’s main east-west line.
“I think there’s a great chance we can make this a hub, coming out of Mexico, coming out of California and coming out of the East Coast,” Walkup said.