Construction of the inland port in Gainesville is expected to begin here

The inland port will add a new 324 mile long intermodal rail freight service to directly connect the port of Savannah to 104 acres in the Gateway Industrial Center north of Gainesville. It would also include six railroad tracks, approximately 18,000 feet in total, connected to the Norfolk Southern Crescent Corridor.

“Over the past two years, maybe three years, we, the agency, have purchased land on behalf of the county that would be sold to GPA,” said Tread Syfan, attorney for the development agency, at the meeting on Tuesday.

That lot should be the last section GPA needs to begin construction, Syfan said.

“We sold the large lot for the inland port (in 2018), but (GPA) engineers designed a new access road so they needed this extra lot to find their access road to the inland port facility,” said Syfan.

This summer, GPA received a $ 46 million grant from the US Department of Transportation. Phil Wilheit, chairman of the development agency, said the grant has helped postpone the expected completion date by a full year, and the port is slated to open in 2024.

Receiving federal funding meant GPA had to go through a National Environmental Policy Act approval process. The comment deadline for NEPA approval expired last week, said Brian Rochester of Rochester and Associates, who is doing engineering on the project. This means that the federal government’s building permit for the project should be available soon.

The post Construction of the inland port in Gainesville is expected to begin here first appeared on Daily Florida Press.

from Daily Florida Press https://dailyfloridapress.com/construction-of-the-inland-port-in-gainesville-is-expected-to-begin-here/