WINSLOW, Ariz. — Atlas Global is part of a nearly $1 million federal grant and already owns thousands of acres of land in Winslow, but that doesn’t mean the 3,750-acre industrial mega site they plan for the city is a done deal.
The Scottsdale-based industrial development company is planning on building giant warehouses around the railroad tracks for advanced and heavy manufacturing, including manufactured wood products, renewable energy production and storage, semiconductor supplies and aerospace technologies. The new businesses coming in would mean a substantial amount of new infrastructure for the city, as well as thousands of potential new jobs.
Atlas is using funds from a $974,000 U.S. Department of Transportation planning grant awarded to Bernalillo County, New Mexico, with five other private and public partner organizations, including the city of Winslow. These funds are for the larger Interstate 40 Tradeport Corridor project, meant to make trade across the country more streamlined and energy efficient.
I-40 is the third longest interstate in the country at 805 miles, beginning in Barstow, California and ending in Wilmington, North Carolina. In Arizona, it covers around 359 miles through Kingman, Flagstaff, Winslow and Holbrook.
Atlas believes Winslow’s location near the west coast between Mexico and Denver makes it strategic for trade: an ideal location for an industrial logistics hub. Around 24,000 vehicles per day pass through Winslow’s section of I-40, according to Arizona Department of Transportation. The proximity of BNSF railroad and the Winslow-Lindbergh Regional Airport also make the location desirable.
“All three modes (of transportation) come together here. If we can get all three of those and want to be in the southwest, this is the site,” Atlas Global’s Managing Director Daniel Lupien said in the second of two public meetings at Winslow Chamber of Commerce and Visitor Center Dec. 14.
But what would an industrial park actually look like for Winslow?
Winslow City Manager David Coolidge said Atlas is in escrow for city-owned land south of the Winslow airport, where the majority of the development would be located.
“You will have buildings — they’ll be combination-type buildings where you have manufacturing and warehouse inside of the same facility,” Coolidge said. “They won’t be your traditional (factory) buildings with smokestacks and stuff. Really they’re looking at more tech-sector stuff. And so you might see places that are refurbishing and remanufacturing electric batteries for cars.”
Coolidge said a good visual would be to look at Kingman.
The Kingman Industrial Park is located next to the Kingman Municipal Airport and near I-40. The Kingman Terminal Railroad operates 3 miles of track at the park and serves interchanges with BNSF. Atlas would like to have a similar structure with the rail.
City of Winslow staff toured Kingman’s facilities in November.
“When we toured it they explained that it accounts for about 3,000 jobs and about $1.1 million of cable on an annual basis, so that’s considerable,” Coolidge said.
The city of Kingman, in collaboration with Winslow, join other regional stakeholders as part of the Regional Infrastructure Accelerator by the USDOT.
Kingman plans to host a truck mobility complex to cater to electric and hydrogen trucks, and function as a logistical hub for private investment.
The stretch on I-40 between Kingman and Winslow, known as the I40TPC Winslow, is the first focus of the project.
If the plan is approved in Winslow, the first phase includes building a rail park on 180 acres east of the Winslow airport and south of La Posada Hotel.
“They’re looking to build out anywhere from 5-15 miles worth of rail that will weave in and out of that park,” Coolidge said. “Really, that’s (Atlas’) focus, pushing rail through most of the industrial site, that way you can have advanced manufacturing that could manufacture their goods quickly.”
The rail project is subject to approval by BNSF and Atlas’s entire project is still subject to approval by the city of Winslow.
Winslow has been in talks with Atlas since the spring of 2022. The closing date for the sale of the city-owned property is early February 2024, although Coolidge expects that closing date could be extended.
The 75-page development agreement is currently going back and forth between attorneys.
“One of the pre-requirements to close on escrow is the development agreement,” Coolidge said. “It’s everything that you could possibly think of — what types of uses will there be? Who’s going to pay for infrastructure? And all those different types of things. So we have to come to an agreement.”
Commercial interest
Lupien said the rail park plans are close to be finalized and the first building could be delivered within seven months.
“That’s going to be (for) smaller, light-industrial type products focused on biomass,” he said.
Twenty-four companies are already interested in the industrial park, according to Lupien. These include industries in solar modular production, hydrogen production and battery recycling. Eight of those companies need access to some type of biomass, have large land requirements and require rail access.
“There’s a lot of manufacturers that are moving home from overseas, they’re reshoring, and they have requirements,” Lupien said, mentioning how Winslow meets these requirements but will need some updates, especially the airport. “When you see that type of infrastructure that’s underutilized, there’s some opportunity, especially for the customers we’re going after, which are larger manufacturers.”
But Lupien said Atlas’s project will not just benefit those large manufacturers, but the entire region.
“There’s a lot of value here in Winslow that cannot only help the town and grow businesses here and opportunities, but it also helps the region, including the Hopi, Navajo, Joseph City, Holbrook, even Flagstaff,” he said. “And it also helps the ports with mobility, getting things moving again.”
Exponential growth
City staff is considering the immense growth that is likely to occur if the project is approved. The I-40 TradePort Corridor system is expected to create approximately 60,000 jobs in both Arizona and New Mexico, and Lupien said he expects 8,000-10,000 jobs to open up in Winslow with the variety of industries. Winslow currently has around 9,000 residents.
“We anticipate that a large portion of the (workers) will already be in town,” Coolidge said. “A lot of those jobs will be consumed by locals. And then to achieve growth you’re going to have to have people move into town because certainly if you create (thousands) of jobs, you’re not going to fill 100% of them by local workers.”
That doesn’t mean thousands of people will flood into Winslow at once.
“Kingman’s a perfect example. If you look at their population growth, it’s a considerable amount of growth within the last 10-15 years,” Coolidge said. “I anticipate this entire project — you’re probably looking at a 25 year timeline. It could go faster… but in all likelihood with that much development and construction and infrastructure, it’s not something that’s going to happen that quickly.”
Lupien said he could foresee at least 1,000 jobs opening up in three to four years after the larger infrastructure is in place for employers.
Along with the influx of new jobs opening up in Winslow inevitably comes the need for more housing. Lupien said Jan.5 Atlas has closed on 1,800 acres in the area and have 2,300 acres in long-term escrows.
“We have several sites north of I-40, up over by Walmart, a little further over by Transcon, and we have two planned subdivisions, each with 500 homes,” Lupien said. He is also in deals with some other land and building owners in town, and would like to utilize the old concrete factory.
For the subdivisions, Lupien said he is looking into energy-efficient modular homes that are cheaper and easier to build.
“They will subcontract housing developers or go into a development agreement and sell their land into housing developers to build out housing because they know they’re going to need both,” Coolidge said.
There was a question whether some housing would be guaranteed for locals at the Dec. 14 meeting, and Lupien said that he would need to look into the legality of it, but did agree that he would like to make that possible.
Water usage
Another concern brought up at the Dec. 14 meeting was the availability of city water.
Lupien said Atlas wants to tap into the Coconino Aquifer for hydrogen production, which will withdraw an immense amount of water. He said they have engineers studying the effects of taking out of specific areas and surface flow. Citizens wanted to make sure area wells wouldn’t be drained.
“Our focus has always been to make sure we have adequate supplies of water, we’re able to process wastewater, all that stuff for the community along with achieving growth,” Coolidge said. “The city has processes in place to make sure that we can maintain those requirements and those needs for community use.”
Coolidge said if one group wanted to use 10 million gallons of water a day, the city would ask them to put reclamation processes in place. He said they would never put the city at risk.
Lupien too, said that he is concerned about the city’s well-being.
“We don’t plan on doing anything that there’s not consensus on,” Lupien said. “I’m never going to make a decision that the City Council or the mayor was against.”
Tribal and county land
Some of the proposed industrial site is located on Navajo County land, which would need to be annexed by Winslow, Lupien said.
Lupien said he was also working on a land deal with the Hopi relating to the Winslow project.Lupien said part of what he is really excited about is bringing the Native American workforce to Winslow, which has a 37% Native American population.
“One of our primary priorities is to demonstrate what the Native American work force is capable of in this country,” Lupien said. “Our primary workforce that we’re targeting in Winslow is Native American. Not only Native Americans that live in the Four Corner region, but the 400,000 Native Americans who have left Four Corners in pursuit of opportunities in other parts of the country. We’re hopeful that we can entice them to return and work here, closer to their families.”
Winslow Mayor Roberta Wilcox Cano, who is half Navajo, said she thinks the Atlas development could be a big game-changer, and wants to explore the potential. She thinks the industries could be beneficial to the next generation.
“I want to be known for being more than a prison town or a railroad town, and that’s what this potentially could be,” Cano said. “Some of the concepts and the industries that they’re talking about are very much so that our young ones and our students, our kids and our grandkids, are having to have more technical education.”
Cano is very much pro-growth, and said Winslow hasn’t had much real growth or development since the prison was installed in the late 80’s, which is part of the reason she thinks there is some skepticism and confusion about Atlas.
At the same time, Cano said the city is being careful when considering the industrial park project and still seeing if Atlas is the right fit. She encourages all residents to go to meetings or visit council personally at city hall with questions.
Community concerns
Jarvis Kerr, who has lived in Winslow since 1978, said during his residency he has seen “several schemes come and go,” including the pine tar plant, Transcon Trucking, Super Green City, Hopi Hat Factory and Alaska Camper.
“It appears another one is imminent,” Kerr said.
Resident Mary Grayeske is also skeptical..
“Atlas Global acts like it’s a done deal,” Grayeske said. “They put up websites like its already happening and that it’s this miracle kind of problem solver for Interstate 40.”
Atlas Global’s project website is i40tradeport.com.
WINSLOW, Ariz. — Atlas Global is part of a nearly $1 million federal grant and already owns thousands of acres of land in Winslow, but that doesn’t mean the 3,750-acre industrial mega site they plan for the city is a done deal.
The Scottsdale-based industrial development company is planning on building giant warehouses around the railroad tracks for advanced and heavy manufacturing, including manufactured wood products, renewable energy production and storage, semiconductor supplies and aerospace technologies. The new businesses coming in would mean a substantial amount of new infrastructure for the city, as well as thousands of potential new jobs.
Atlas is using funds from a $974,000 U.S. Department of Transportation planning grant awarded to Bernalillo County, New Mexico, with five other private and public partner organizations, including the city of Winslow. These funds are for the larger Interstate 40 Tradeport Corridor project, meant to make trade across the country more streamlined and energy efficient.
I-40 is the third longest interstate in the country at 805 miles, beginning in Barstow, California and ending in Wilmington, North Carolina. In Arizona, it covers around 359 miles through Kingman, Flagstaff, Winslow and Holbrook.
Atlas believes Winslow’s location near the west coast between Mexico and Denver makes it strategic for trade: an ideal location for an industrial logistics hub. Around 24,000 vehicles per day pass through Winslow’s section of I-40, according to Arizona Department of Transportation. The proximity of BNSF railroad and the Winslow-Lindbergh Regional Airport also make the location desirable.
“All three modes (of transportation) come together here. If we can get all three of those and want to be in the southwest, this is the site,” Atlas Global’s Managing Director Daniel Lupien said in the second of two public meetings at Winslow Chamber of Commerce and Visitor Center Dec. 14.
But what would an industrial park actually look like for Winslow?
Winslow City Manager David Coolidge said Atlas is in escrow for city-owned land south of the Winslow airport, where the majority of the development would be located.
“You will have buildings — they’ll be combination-type buildings where you have manufacturing and warehouse inside of the same facility,” Coolidge said. “They won’t be your traditional (factory) buildings with smokestacks and stuff. Really they’re looking at more tech-sector stuff. And so you might see places that are refurbishing and remanufacturing electric batteries for cars.”
Coolidge said a good visual would be to look at Kingman.
The Kingman Industrial Park is located next to the Kingman Municipal Airport and near I-40. The Kingman Terminal Railroad operates 3 miles of track at the park and serves interchanges with BNSF. Atlas would like to have a similar structure with the rail.
City of Winslow staff toured Kingman’s facilities in November.
“When we toured it they explained that it accounts for about 3,000 jobs and about $1.1 million of cable on an annual basis, so that’s considerable,” Coolidge said.
The city of Kingman, in collaboration with Winslow, join other regional stakeholders as part of the Regional Infrastructure Accelerator by the USDOT.
Kingman plans to host a truck mobility complex to cater to electric and hydrogen trucks, and function as a logistical hub for private investment.
The stretch on I-40 between Kingman and Winslow, known as the I40TPC Winslow, is the first focus of the project.
If the plan is approved in Winslow, the first phase includes building a rail park on 180 acres east of the Winslow airport and south of La Posada Hotel.
“They’re looking to build out anywhere from 5-15 miles worth of rail that will weave in and out of that park,” Coolidge said. “Really, that’s (Atlas’) focus, pushing rail through most of the industrial site, that way you can have advanced manufacturing that could manufacture their goods quickly.”
The rail project is subject to approval by BNSF and Atlas’s entire project is still subject to approval by the city of Winslow.
Winslow has been in talks with Atlas since the spring of 2022. The closing date for the sale of the city-owned property is early February 2024, although Coolidge expects that closing date could be extended.
The 75-page development agreement is currently going back and forth between attorneys.
“One of the pre-requirements to close on escrow is the development agreement,” Coolidge said. “It’s everything that you could possibly think of — what types of uses will there be? Who’s going to pay for infrastructure? And all those different types of things. So we have to come to an agreement.”
Commercial interest
Lupien said the rail park plans are close to be finalized and the first building could be delivered within seven months.
“That’s going to be (for) smaller, light-industrial type products focused on biomass,” he said.
Twenty-four companies are already interested in the industrial park, according to Lupien. These include industries in solar modular production, hydrogen production and battery recycling. Eight of those companies need access to some type of biomass, have large land requirements and require rail access.
“There’s a lot of manufacturers that are moving home from overseas, they’re reshoring, and they have requirements,” Lupien said, mentioning how Winslow meets these requirements but will need some updates, especially the airport. “When you see that type of infrastructure that’s underutilized, there’s some opportunity, especially for the customers we’re going after, which are larger manufacturers.”
But Lupien said Atlas’s project will not just benefit those large manufacturers, but the entire region.
“There’s a lot of value here in Winslow that cannot only help the town and grow businesses here and opportunities, but it also helps the region, including the Hopi, Navajo, Joseph City, Holbrook, even Flagstaff,” he said. “And it also helps the ports with mobility, getting things moving again.”
Exponential growth
City staff is considering the immense growth that is likely to occur if the project is approved. The I-40 TradePort Corridor system is expected to create approximately 60,000 jobs in both Arizona and New Mexico, and Lupien said he expects 8,000-10,000 jobs to open up in Winslow with the variety of industries. Winslow currently has around 9,000 residents.
“We anticipate that a large portion of the (workers) will already be in town,” Coolidge said. “A lot of those jobs will be consumed by locals. And then to achieve growth you’re going to have to have people move into town because certainly if you create (thousands) of jobs, you’re not going to fill 100% of them by local workers.”
That doesn’t mean thousands of people will flood into Winslow at once.
“Kingman’s a perfect example. If you look at their population growth, it’s a considerable amount of growth within the last 10-15 years,” Coolidge said. “I anticipate this entire project — you’re probably looking at a 25 year timeline. It could go faster… but in all likelihood with that much development and construction and infrastructure, it’s not something that’s going to happen that quickly.”
Lupien said he could foresee at least 1,000 jobs opening up in three to four years after the larger infrastructure is in place for employers.
Along with the influx of new jobs opening up in Winslow inevitably comes the need for more housing. Lupien said Jan.5 Atlas has closed on 1,800 acres in the area and have 2,300 acres in long-term escrows.
“We have several sites north of I-40, up over by Walmart, a little further over by Transcon, and we have two planned subdivisions, each with 500 homes,” Lupien said. He is also in deals with some other land and building owners in town, and would like to utilize the old concrete factory.
For the subdivisions, Lupien said he is looking into energy-efficient modular homes that are cheaper and easier to build.
“They will subcontract housing developers or go into a development agreement and sell their land into housing developers to build out housing because they know they’re going to need both,” Coolidge said.
There was a question whether some housing would be guaranteed for locals at the Dec. 14 meeting, and Lupien said that he would need to look into the legality of it, but did agree that he would like to make that possible.
Water usage
Another concern brought up at the Dec. 14 meeting was the availability of city water.
Lupien said Atlas wants to tap into the Coconino Aquifer for hydrogen production, which will withdraw an immense amount of water. He said they have engineers studying the effects of taking out of specific areas and surface flow. Citizens wanted to make sure area wells wouldn’t be drained.
“Our focus has always been to make sure we have adequate supplies of water, we’re able to process wastewater, all that stuff for the community along with achieving growth,” Coolidge said. “The city has processes in place to make sure that we can maintain those requirements and those needs for community use.”
Coolidge said if one group wanted to use 10 million gallons of water a day, the city would ask them to put reclamation processes in place. He said they would never put the city at risk.
Lupien too, said that he is concerned about the city’s well-being.
“We don’t plan on doing anything that there’s not consensus on,” Lupien said. “I’m never going to make a decision that the City Council or the mayor was against.”
Tribal and county land
Some of the proposed industrial site is located on Navajo County land, which would need to be annexed by Winslow, Lupien said.
Lupien said he was also working on a land deal with the Hopi relating to the Winslow project.Lupien said part of what he is really excited about is bringing the Native American workforce to Winslow, which has a 37% Native American population.
“One of our primary priorities is to demonstrate what the Native American work force is capable of in this country,” Lupien said. “Our primary workforce that we’re targeting in Winslow is Native American. Not only Native Americans that live in the Four Corner region, but the 400,000 Native Americans who have left Four Corners in pursuit of opportunities in other parts of the country. We’re hopeful that we can entice them to return and work here, closer to their families.”
Winslow Mayor Roberta Wilcox Cano, who is half Navajo, said she thinks the Atlas development could be a big game-changer, and wants to explore the potential. She thinks the industries could be beneficial to the next generation.
“I want to be known for being more than a prison town or a railroad town, and that’s what this potentially could be,” Cano said. “Some of the concepts and the industries that they’re talking about are very much so that our young ones and our students, our kids and our grandkids, are having to have more technical education.”
Cano is very much pro-growth, and said Winslow hasn’t had much real growth or development since the prison was installed in the late 80’s, which is part of the reason she thinks there is some skepticism and confusion about Atlas.
At the same time, Cano said the city is being careful when considering the industrial park project and still seeing if Atlas is the right fit. She encourages all residents to go to meetings or visit council personally at city hall with questions.
Community concerns
Jarvis Kerr, who has lived in Winslow since 1978, said during his residency he has seen “several schemes come and go,” including the pine tar plant, Transcon Trucking, Super Green City, Hopi Hat Factory and Alaska Camper.
“It appears another one is imminent,” Kerr said.
Resident Mary Grayeske is also skeptical..
“Atlas Global acts like it’s a done deal,” Grayeske said. “They put up websites like its already happening and that it’s this miracle kind of problem solver for Interstate 40.”
Atlas Global’s project website is i40tradeport.com.