View Single Post
  #80  
Old Posted Feb 4, 2010, 1:10 AM
Johnny Ryall Johnny Ryall is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 1,967
Memphis Metro Interstate System Development

DeSoto County, MS Officials Eye I-269’s Potential



ERIC SMITH | The Daily News

Interstate 69 is dubbed the “NAFTA Highway” after the North American Free Trade Agreement because it will course through the central U.S. from Canada to Mexico, connecting the continent’s three nations. One of the highway’s key links is Memphis, where the road will intersect with I-269, a beltway that when complete will loop around the area’s outlying communities and provide easier access for vehicles – passenger and freight – traveling into or out of the region. The southern leg of I-269 will stretch for 30 miles across DeSoto County, prompting officials there to begin planning for the road’s effect on potential commercial real estate development. No one understands the importance of I-269 for the county’s economic development more than Jim McDougal, director of the DeSoto County Planning Commission, who has been thinking about this project for the past six years. McDougal envisions the DeSoto County portion of I-269 as more than just another road project that causes urban sprawl, although that is one of the chief concerns surrounding the highway. Instead, he sees the road as an “international trade corridor,” where local, regional, national and even global companies will set up shop by building their distribution centers, transportation hubs and office headquarters. “Obviously it is a tremendous complement to our transportation and logistics industries in the area, but I think it also presents enormous opportunity for us to look at being a location for North American corporate offices,” McDougal said. “We’re right in the center of this whole logistical corridor, and what could be a better spot for dealing with all the commerce in the entire eastern half of the country than right here?”

International opportunities
McDougal’s concept moved closer to reality late last year when the county’s board of supervisors issued a request for qualifications from planning, engineering and architectural firms to create a master plan for the international trade corridor. The study will examine a corridor that encompasses two miles north and two miles south of I-269’s length – 120 square miles or 76,800 acres. A selection committee received seven submissions and narrowed the list down to two teams, each composed of multiple planning and design firms from around the country. The DeSoto Planning Commission on Feb. 25 will recommend a team to the board of supervisors, which will announce the winning bid at its March 3 meeting. The selected team will be tasked with conducting the entire international trade corridor study – with creating the “next major economic and social and cultural development in the Mid-South,” McDougal said. “A highway will develop by itself whether we plan anything or not,” McDougal said. “With an international trade corridor, we have a special opportunity to become part of the whole international business conversation.” The goal, McDougal said, is to find the highest and best land uses for this mostly rural acreage that stretches through the middle of the fastest-growing community in the Mid-South. One advantage DeSoto County has, besides a favorable tax incentive program for businesses, is its proximity to areas where automakers are making investments and where other economic development has sprouted in recent years. “We’re sitting here right in the middle of the Toyota plant in Blue Springs to our southeast and the gaming industry to the southwest,” McDougal said. “We have an opportunity, because so much of our area is open and not developed, to see what kind of development we want to be there and to have a tremendous influence on it on the front end.”

Regional transformation
Though McDougal said he couldn’t yet put a price tag on the project, he has applied for several funding sources and is awaiting responses. Also, the master plan will be completed with the help of the Memphis Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO), the regional transportation planning group that helps cities and counties plan for their infrastructure needs and secure federal and state transportation dollars. MPO transportation planner Paul Morris said the international trade corridor study is a smart approach to preparing for a project that could transform a regional economic landscape already centered on transportation, distribution and logistics. “Memphis, whether people realize it or not, is a very, very significant player in the trade of not only America, but around the world, especially in terms of freight movement,” Morris said. “Whenever you build a nice highway, there are always people who want to develop along that corridor. The real question is: We need a vision of how that highway should develop.”

Existing High Priority Corridor> Regional>
Soon to be comissioned

Last edited by Johnny Ryall; Aug 2, 2013 at 1:57 PM.
Reply With Quote