State economic initiative could help Wilmington
Ohio plans to spend $100 million to expand logistics industry
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Ohio's plan to invest $100 million to support expansion of the state's logistics and distribution industry could open an opportunity for Wilmington, which stands to lose thousands of jobs when DHL shifts work away from its U.S. freight hub there in 2009.
After DHL's impending departure, the city will still be home to the German-owned company's 2,200-acre airport, cargo sorting facilities and aircraft maintenance hangars, which Ohio officials describe as the nation's largest privately owned airport.
So, Wilmington officials are examining Ohio's offer to match private or nonprofit investment in logistics and distribution facility projects with investments of up to $10 million per project. The investments, backed by state bonds and general revenue funds, are to be available from 2009 through 2011.
Ohio Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher's close involvement with a task force forming Wilmington's economic development plans for the post-DHL era could help Wilmington respond to Ohio's offer, said Wilmington Mayor David Raizk, who co-chairs the task force with Fisher.
"We're going to respond to it and work very closely with the Department of Development," Raizk said.
Ohio's pitch is part of the $1.57 billion stimulus plan that Gov. Ted Strickland signed in June. The overall plan is intended to create 50,000 jobs, including a projected 4,200 over the next three years in Ohio's logistics and distribution industry.
The logistics effort seeks to create jobs by improving intermodal freight-shipping links to or through Ohio between rail, water and truck modes of transportation. It would take advantage of the state's central location in the United States, its rail access through the CSX and Norfolk Southern railroads and its ports along Lake Erie and the Ohio River, said Mark Barbash, chief economic development officer for the Ohio Department of Transportation.
It would build on Norfolk Southern Corp.'s Heartland Corridor, a three-year railway and tunnel improvement project through 2010 that is intended to allow trains to carry double-stacked freight containers between Norfolk, Va., and Chicago. In support of that project, an intermodal terminal was opened in March adjacent to Rickenbacker International Airport at Columbus for transfer of freight between trains and trucks.
Ohio could benefit from economic growth if its investments improve infrastructure at rail freight ramps around the state, said Michael Gorman, an associate professor of operations at the University of Dayton School of Business.
Along with the DHL airport at Wilmington, the Dayton region already has an existing logistics facility in the former Menlo Worldwide Forwarding/Emery Air Freight facility that United Parcel Service closed at Dayton International Airport in June 2006. UPS said it has no plans to reopen that facility.
