| Ridge Property Trust and Jones Lang LaSalle think they have a winner with the new 1,500 acre, $1.5B Ridgeport Logistics Center in Wilmington (near Joliet). The new development is shovel-ready and fully entitled for 20M SF in new land sites, to be marketed by JLL. | |
| We snapped Ridge's Kyle Schuhmacher, JLL's Steve Ostrowski and Keith Stauber, Ridge's Jennifer Wagener, and JLL's John Carver and Dominic Carbonari after the announcement of the center at the Inland Ports Conference yesterday. John, based in LA, says that Chicago's status as the nation's largest inland port, along with the rail-served aspects of the park, should make it a success. The park is connected to the BNSF railroad by a spur that's currently being built. (Now if they could only land B&O railroad and St. Charles Place.) The development at I-55 and Lorenzo Road will be able to house heavy manufacturing but will most likely house larger distribution centers, Keith tells us. They're ready to start leasing and selling space right away. | |
| FTR Associates' Lawrence Gross told conference-goers intermodal traffic is the highest of any freight traffic; he also says the US has moved toward a four-corners distribution center since the widening of the Panama Canal rather than the traditional California and NY-area ports system. The US is also growing as a domestic distributor, which is good news for a hub city like Chicago. Most importantly, he doesn't see a double-dip recession (economically speaking, we presume. Nautically, if a boat wants to double dip, what's the harm?) He sees slow GDP growth of 2.5% to 2.9% a year. |
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