ATLANTA — Americold Realty Trust will spend $127 million on a 335,000-square-foot cold storage facility in Kansas City, Mo., the first in a series of planned facilities to be located along the CPKC rail network, the company announced Thursday (Feb. 22).
CPKC and Americold announced their collaboration last year, and said then that the first facility would be in Kansas City [see “CPKC and Americold team up …,” Trains News Wire, June 21, 2023].
Americold said it plans to create nearly 190 new jobs in the region. Pending local approvals, the company plans to begin construction in the first half of 2024.
“Americold’s Kansas City facility marks the first of many new Americold warehouse facilities we intend to see built on the CPKC network as part of our strategic collaboration,” CPKC CEO Keith Creel said in a press release. “Our unmatched Mexico Midwest Express premium intermodal service will enable Americold customers to transport goods between the U.S. and Mexico more efficiently and effectively than ever before. We look forward to continuing to grow with Americold as we support the cold storage ecosystem.”
Americold CEO George Chapelle said the company is “excited to kick off our strategic collaboration with CPKC through our new Kansas City cold storage facility, expanding Americold’s presence in an important U.S. transportation hub. Combining our cold storage capabilities with CPKC’s extensive rail network enables Americold to deliver a differentiated offering to support more customers across North America.”
This is just Keith Creel tooting his own horn again. Refrigerated traffic to Mexico is practically nil. From Mexico to the US is a different story. UP and BNSF have the best gateway’s for those movements plus better relations with Ferromex (20% owned by UP) than CPkc. Plus with the UP/BNSF new gateway being built at Eagle Pass (just up the river) transit times should be faster and cheaper with less “interference” than CPkc’s Eagle Pass bridge. But I guess time will tell.
I would be curious to know whom they think this will serve. Most eastbound reefers usually are headed to 2 locations, Kingsbury, Indiana or Rotterdam, NY.
California based produce….which had been on the brink of death due to drought the last 7 or 8 years, will no doubt make a loud comeback with all of the rain they are getting the last 2 years. Even when it suffered, UP was carrying much of the produce to Chicago on a route that is not via KCMO.
So the question begs, if CPKC has express interchange with CSX and NS down in Mississippi, wouldnt they route Mexico sourced reefers going east through Meridian to reach all points east? Or does CPKC think they can get Mexico sourced reefers to KCMO and Chicago and go either way (west or east) faster?
How is NS or CSX going to carry the coffee and pineapples that come in via Jacksonville from South America to all points west? CPKC can’t help here, at least not going to the western US, you need UP and BNSF for that.