CenterPoint Properties announced the development of a state-of-the-art transload facility for Saturn Agriculture Inc., at CenterPoint Intermodal Center – Joliet. Saturn will occupy a 14.4-acre parcel, operating an agricultural transload facility to transfer local soybeans and dried distilled grains into international containers. Dan Leahy and Adam Roth of NAI Hiffman worked diligently with CenterPoint development team members Eric Gilbert and Jeremy Grey of CenterPoint, while John Suerth of CBRE represented William Huang of Saturn in the transaction.
“Saturn will take advantage of the strategic location of the parcel – positioned between both the Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) and Union Pacific (UP) intermodal yards to efficiently export agricultural products to Asia,” remarked Senior Vice President, Infrastructure and Logistics, Eric Gilbert of CenterPoint Properties. “CenterPoint is thankful to the City of Joliet for their hard work and support to help attract this new business to the park; Saturn chose to make a large investment in Joliet due to their business friendly environment.”
Saturn entered into a 10-year lease on the built-to-suit facility, which includes features such as loading, dump and storage components. The facility will have the ability to load 200+ containers per day. The property is strategically located and designed with the capacity for future expansion, situated on the private road system within CIC-Joliet, which allows Saturn to take advantage of permit free moves to the UP’s yard while significantly reducing overall drayage costs. Operations at the facility will begin in autumn 2015.
“We are truly excited about another investment in an agricultural transload facility in Will County,” said Will County Executive, Larry Walsh. “The new facility will help local farmers and grain haulers by providing another destination option for their product.”
The facility will enhance the agricultural transload platform at CIC-Joliet, which is the largest agricultural export hub in the Midwest, and bring 8-10 new jobs to the area. Currently, there are more than 105 million bushels of locally produced agricultural products exported annually from the park. Saturn’s goal is to ensure a smooth flowing transition between the suppliers and the end user, by unloading trucks quickly and delivering the product as efficiently as possible.
“It’s exciting to see Saturn make an investment like this,” remarked Manager of the Will County farm Bureau, Mark Schneidewind. “The supply chain and logistics efficiencies at this significant agriculture export hub, will provide better competitive pricing for our commodities, while helping to reduce the costs associated with getting the product to the final market destination.”
