By Dr. Elba Garcia, Dallas County Commissioner for District 4 (with information compiled from other sources)
It is often mentioned, but what is the Dallas County Inland Port?
Simply put, the Dallas County Inland Port (DCIP) is a 120-square-mile (76,000-acre) area that encompasses five Dallas County cities: Hutchins, Wilmer, Lancaster, DeSoto and Dallas, and more than 100,000 residents. Economically speaking, the DCIP currently serves as a base of operations for 110-plus employers, and that number is still growing.
Although there is no waterway for shipping, what makes this area so attractive to businesses is that the DCIP has direct access to three major interstate highways, I-35, I-20, and I-45, making all major North American markets accessible within 48 hours by truck.
Of particular note is I-35, which provides access to goods from Mexico through the Port of Laredo, the number one inland port along the U.S.-Mexico border. This allows goods from Mexico to move east/west through the United States, typically with a stop at one of the many warehouses in the inland port.
Additionally, the DCIP has access to multiple rail lines including Burlington Northern Santa Fe, LLC, and Kansas City Southern. It is also home to the Union Pacific Dallas Intermodal Terminal which carries goods via rail throughout the United States.
Union Pacific Intermodal Facility
The Union Pacific Intermodal Facility (UPIF) processes 360,000 containers annually and has the capability to process up to 500,000. The facility typically processes two to three trains per day and has the capacity to process up to three or four trains per day.
Due to port congestion on the west coast and a shortage of chassis to transport cargo containers by rail, the facility currently processes one train every few days.
The UPIF is situated on 367 acres. Over one million cubic feet of dirt was excavated to build the site, making it the second largest UPIF in the United States, and the only intermodal facility in the country adjacent to an interstate highway.
The DCIP is the fastest-growing industrial area in the U.S. It currently supports 30,000 jobs and projects an additional 6,000 jobs to be created over the next three years.
There are now over 120 companies, both large and small, that occupy space in the Port, among them are Walmart, Procter & Gamble, Georgia-Pacific, Kohls, Unilever, and Medline Industries. DCIP houses FedEx’s second-largest U.S. facility, and Amazon occupies about four million square feet of buildings.
Plaquemines Port Harbor & Terminal District
The projected growth is expected to be enhanced even further by new cargo traffic expected to soon flow through Plaquemines Port Harbor & Terminal District in Louisiana.
Plaquemines Port is partnering with APM Terminals North America to open a deep water, multimodal, state-of-the-art container terminal located at the mouth of the Mississippi River in 2023.
Plaquemines Port is currently the thirteenth largest tonnage port in the U.S. As the only natural deepwater port in that area of the Gulf of Mexico, it has the ability to process the increasing number of multiple megavessel container ships.
As a convenient, cost-effective alternative to congested ports on the west coast, Plaquemines Port is expected to deliver up to a million cargo containers to Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio. The Dallas County Inland Port is well situated to accommodate the ship-to-rail and ship-to-truck traffic coming into the area via the Union Pacific Intermodal Facility or via interstate highways.
Need for Regional Coordination
Other than a transportation management authority, local chambers of commerce and economic development organizations, there is no entity or authority coordinating, advocating for, or planning the development of the Port as a regional entity, or guiding and promoting its growth.
There is no single source that is gathering statistics for the area, making it difficult to obtain data on the DCIP; however, Dallas County is working to establish the Inland Port of Dallas County Local Government Corporation (LGC) to coordinate advertising and marketing, oversee the overall status of the Port, and efforts to improve the Port’s alliances with ships, railroads, and other entities important to the region wide development of the Port. Dallas County Commissioners took a major step toward this goal in June 2022, voting to move forward with a plan and begin discussions with the municipalities that reside within the Port’s boundaries to create an LGC that would serve as the Port’s governing authority.
The Dallas County Inland Port has experienced explosive growth over the last decade, becoming an enormous economic generator and jobs-creator for North Texas. It is a key link in the national and international supply chains serving the United States, positioning the region to continue its growth for decades to come.
