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Here are a couple of important numbers related to the CSX railroad logistics center planned for Winter Haven.
The first is 8,500. That’s the figure CSX and Winter Haven officials have often touted in predicting the how many jobs the center would create at full build-out. If correct, that number would make the CSX center Polk’s second largest employer, ahead of Publix and behind only the public schools.
But that number – 8,500—requires quite a bit of context. As CSX’s projections make clear, the 300-acre train-to-truck yard, which makes up the first phase of the project, will employ 200 people when it’s built, likely in 2009. Another 1,800 jobs are projected for the 900-acre second phase, which will consist mostly of warehouse and office space operated by companies that rent from CSX. That’s it for direct employment at the center.
If you’re counting, that brings us to 2,000 mostly warehouse jobs. That would make the CSX center a top-15 Polk employer, but not the giant suggested by 8,500 jobs.
So where are the other 6,500 jobs?
They are far more theoretical. CSX labels them as “employment outside the park.” They are either employees of suppliers for companies located in the park, or “employees whose work depends on income generated directly or indirectly at the park.” CSX uses restaurant and convenience store workers as examples of that second group.
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Our next number is 1,150. That’s the number of daily truck trips onto State Road 60 that CSX expects the
first phase of the project to create. Winter Haven city planners say that should not affect the level of service on State Road 60.
They were not required to – and didn’t – project impact on U.S. 27 or U.S. 98 (Bartow Road). Those two highways are virtually the only logical way for a truck to get from S.R. 60 to the Polk Parkway or Interstate 4. Several stretches of U.S. 98 are considered failing today.
That 1,150 does not include the traffic that would be generated by the second, more warehouse-intensive phase of the project. All of that helps show why Winter Haven and Polk County officials are so enthusiastic about the proposed Heartland Parkway, which would tie almost directly into the CSX center.
Nowhere in the project or development files could I find a detailed projection of train traffic. No one I’ve talked to about this, from CSX officials to Lakeland officials to Pete Chichetto, who is shepherding the project for the city of Winter Haven, has been able to lay out the train traffic impact on central Lakeland, which appears to be on the main approach line to the center, or even to the center itself.
The information vacuum is making some people in Lakeland anxious. Developer Jerry Herring, who is building a new condominium project just feet from the downtown line, said he’s disappointed that no one from CSX has laid out what the city can expect.
“There needs to be a dialogue with the community,” Herring said.
Chichetto said Friday he would seek detailed train traffic information from CSX in the hope of easing concerns.
It is obvious that enough mis-information has been spread by CSX and Winter Haven that a Development Regional Impact (DRI) study is needed to protect the citizens of Polk and surrounding counties.
Dee Dee
Why didnt you and the other Sundance subdivision residents buy this land if you wanted it preserved and didnt want CSX to use it?
Jim in Bartow
Billy,
Here are a few numbers CSX and the City of Winter Haven don’t like to discuss either.
80-100 ft. height of lights on site
1150 trucks a day
20 tons of pollution emissions per year per idling truck
0 feet to my property line from site
35 5 acre homesites in Sundance Ranch Estates adjoining site
8-10 ft. size of berm proposed by City of Winter Haven to protect residents from lights, noise, fumes, vibrations
There has been very little discussion on the impacts of this site, other than the potential benefits from the jobs and businesses coming into the area. No one at the City is willing to discuss the impacts to the roads, traffic, loss home values, potential security risks, environmental impact or increased risks of accidents. In my opinion, the City of Winter Haven is moving at extraordinary speeds to get this thing up and running before there can be any serious questions and opposition to it. According to City officials we’ve contacted, the closing on the property will occur ahead of schedule, before midsummer. Once closed, construction will begin immediately.
Does anyone know when they are going to start building this?
From Billy: 2009 is the target year for the rail hub, the rest would follow in subsequent years
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