EL CAMPO, Texas – Vitro Chemicals, a subsidiary of a major Mexico-based glass manufacturer, has committed to a new warehouse in the 540-acre Southwest International Gateway Business Park, a rail-served industrial development created to support cross-border trade.
Located about 60 miles southwest of Houston in El Campo, the park is being developed by Stonemont Financial Group, an Atlanta-based real estate investment firm that specializes in industrial projects. The development is purpose-built for cross-border shippers and offers direct rail access to support international logistics.
The El Campo business park is master-planned for up to 8 million square feet of industrial space. Houston brokers John Simons and Holden Rushing of NAI Partners are marketing the property, which features 1.4 miles of frontage on U.S. Highway 59 at County Road 421. Highway 59 was once known as part of the NAFTA Superhighway.
Rail service at the park is provided by Kansas City Southern (KCS) and its Mexico affiliate, Kansas City Southern de Mexico. The KCS network connects directly to the Pacific Ocean port of Lázaro Cárdenas, the largest port in Mexico, enabling efficient international movements.
Vitro Chemicals, a subsidiary of Vitro—one of the world’s largest glass manufacturers—selected the El Campo park to reduce distribution costs. Currently, the company stores inventory across multiple warehouses in Laredo, Texas, and ships products by truck from there; the new location will streamline their supply chain.
“We couldn’t be happier about having Vitro as our first tenant,” said Zack Markwell, CEO and Managing Principal of Stonemont. “Vitro examined the park’s value proposition for cross-border shippers and their lease commitment validates that the solution we’ve created is competitively superior.”
The development’s core advantage is direct frontage on the Kansas City Southern main line. KCS’s rail network extends from the Pacific coast of Mexico into the U.S. Midwest and its Mexico affiliate handles significant rail traffic across eastern Mexico. By tying the park into the KCS main line, manufacturers in Mexico can ship directly to El Campo rather than exiting the KCS line in Laredo—approximately 250 miles farther from major Texas distribution markets—reducing transit time and costs.
Tenants at the park will also benefit from customs pre-clearance processes that help them avoid delays at congested U.S.–Mexico border crossings. This capability, along with the park’s rail access, reduces exposure to backlogs affecting trucks and trains at other regional distribution centers and ports near the Houston metro area.
“To deliver product to major Texas markets, many Mexico-based manufacturers currently switch to another railroad in Laredo, route through San Antonio, and then contend with the rail and truck congestion around Houston,” said Markwell. The El Campo site offers a more direct, less congested route into Texas markets.
Ridgeline Property Group, another Atlanta-based commercial real estate development and investment firm, is partnering with Stonemont on the project. Watco Companies, a leading short-line railroad operator, will run the short line that connects park buildings to the KCS main line.
Alongside the Vitro facility, a 200,000-square-foot speculative warehouse is planned for development in the near term.
Key features of the master-planned, multi-modal distribution park include:
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Staging capacity for more than 200 rail cars
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Foreign Trade Zone designation and additional state and local economic incentives
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Proximity to six Texas ports within 250 miles: Beaumont, Corpus Christi, Freeport, Galveston, Houston, and Port Arthur
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On-site centralized transload station to facilitate cargo crossing the U.S.–Mexico border
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KCS certification for rail operations
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Ability to deliver build-to-suit facilities within 12 months of an executed lease
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Fully entitled, development-ready, rail-served sites available for lease, build-to-suit, and design-build projects
Feb. 6, 2020 Realty News Report Copyright 2020
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