BNSF, Patriot Line and Utah Inland Port Authority (UIPA) open Phase 1 of a new intermodal complex in Salt Lake City.
A decade long collaboration between two of America’s most innovative railroads – BNSF Railway and Patriot Line — and Utah’s leading transportation and top state officials has paid off with the opening of phase one of a 43-acre intermodal complex on Utah Inland Port Authority (UIPA) land five miles west of the Salt Lake City.
At a recent ribbon cutting for what is officially known as the BNSF Railway Salt Lake City Intermodal Facility, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said “we knew the future of Utah depended on a strong manufacturing sector…and the ability to transport goods — and that is what we are doing here. Every container that reaches Utah more efficiently means more opportunities for our rural producers, our urban manufacturers and the workers who keep our state running.”
“This new facility is an exciting opportunity to improve our capacity and efficiency as the rail industry’s intermodal leader, providing more flexible, competitive options for our customers,” Tom Williams, executive vice president and chief marketing officer of Fort Worth, TX-based BNSF Railway, said at the ribbon cutting. “We are grateful for Patriot Rail and UIPA’s partnership as this new facility will strengthen our supply chains from the West Coast to Utah and beyond.” Patriot Rail Freight Company based in Jacksonville, FL operates 31 shortline railroads in 24 states covering 1,200 miles.
A “Railport” is Launched
In an exclusive interview with the American Journal of Transportation (AJOT), Williams said the new Salt Lake City facility “creates a growth opportunity in a metropolitan area that we didn’t have before. Intermodal shipments like to move into big consumption markets. Plus, this collaborative partnership has created an environment where we can compete against highway shipments more effectively.”
However, while the partnership’s prose sounds promising, what specifically is the BNSF Salt Lake City Intermodal Facility offering shippers today? In response to an AJOT’s questioning, a UIPA spokeswoman said Phase 1 is 24 acres expanding to 42 acres in Phase 2. However, no timetable is given when the expansion would occur.
Currently, she explained, the new intermodal facility can accommodate train lengths of 5,700 feet with the ability to expand. At this point, there are 400 container spaces that can hold 1200 total containers by stacking them three high. The facility is currently using a two-side stacker and employs 10 to 20 container yard workers and can accommodate approximately 150 independent trucking companies.
The BNSF Railway’s intermodal facility at Salt Lake City is said to be the first tangible example of what the seven-year-old Utah Inland Port Authority’s executive director, Ben Hart, calls a “railport” that was created when the prior concept of a single giant logistics-driven statewide transloading terminal for landlocked Utah could not get support or funding. Instead, several smaller, multimodal, rural “hub” terminals around Utah are seen as the smarter solution.
In addition to on-site multimodal transshipping, each rural project will have a foreign trade zone where localized, tax-advantaged manufacturing can be conducted, again to create new jobs, and even a residential component to house administrative personnel and production workers, the UIPA said.
“This is a transformative moment for Utah’s logistics landscape,” Hart told the AJOT exclusively. “The opening of this intermodal facility marks a critical step toward building a more resilient, efficient and sustainable supply chain for our region and the nation.”
Hart isn’t just speaking for Utah’s transportation interests, and he is not a logistics industry lobbyist. Before taking control of the UIPA, he was previously deputy director of Gov. Cox’s Office of Economic Development and knows his way around Utah’s statehouse in Salt Lake City.
Williams of BNSF says the “majority of the initial shipments” will be cargo moving between the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach and Salt Lake City where it currently does not have intermodal facilities on site. The railroad does operate smaller intermodal yards inland in Southern California in San Bernadino and the City of Commerce
“BIG” Intermodal Plans for the Future
Plus, BNSF, the result of a merger between the Burlington Northern and the Santa Fe railroads in 1995-- the nation’s largest railroad and intermodal road, moving 9.5 million units in 2024, 14% more than its nearest competitor--is planning to build a massive 4,600 acre facility called Barstow International Gateway (BIG) outside of Barstow, CA as part of its $3.8 billion corporate capital investment plan for 2025.
BIG, slated for completion in 2028, will be a new connection point for deconsolidating imported cargo from ocean containers into 53-foot domestic containers that can be railed direct to the new BNSF intermodal yard in Salt Lake City for sub-distribution locally and beyond, Williams explains.
BNSF has a major partnership with motor carrier giant J.B. Hunt Trucking in the domestic intermodal market and BIG would be an enticing shipping “option” when finalized, says Williams. He says BNSF is widening its intermodal footprint in the West and acquiring more acreage to expand its existing Phoenix intermodal yard. No timetable has been disclosed but Williams says with Salt Lake City and other capacity expansions under development or planned, BNSF will have intermodal facilities in the Western two-thirds of the US. Says the BNSF executive: “We’re bringing cost and carbon reduction and new capacity to the market for shippers who might possibly otherwise seek an air solution.”
UIPA’s Iron Springs Project Area
Actually, Salt Lake City isn’t UIPA’s first inland intermodal port. In Utah’s southwestern corner, some 275 miles from Salt Lake City, in what is called the Iron Springs Project Area, Building Zone Industries and its affiliate, RailSync, is delivering railcars of steel and lumber to local companies. With seven railcars of steel moving on the Union Pacific Railroad, it is the equivalent of 30 truckloads of steel, a savings of about $75,000 in trucks that did not have to come from a transloading center in Salt Lake City or Phoenix, says Hart.
In fact, Hart says Commerce Crossroads, a new 820-acre sustainable industrial park and transportation hub built in the northwest corner of the state also in partnership with UIPA, was the first rural inland port in Utah.
The momentum is growing. Savage Companies of Salt Lake City, a 77-year-old supply chain and infrastructure solutions provider, is building a 74-acre railport and terminal near rural Cedar City, Utah, to provide transloading services for agricultural products and construction materials. The venture will include an office building, transload equipment and four rail spurs off the Union Pacific’s mainline that can hold a total of 100 railcars.
Meanwhile, UIPA is looking north and figures shippers importing through Pacific Northwest marine ports are prime prospects to benefit from Utah’s growing network of rural inland intermodal ports.
