Montreal-based McInnis Cement plans to build a $40 million distribution warehouse along the East River in the Bronx, N.Y., in hopes of reducing truck traffic in the borough as well as to develop its waterfront, reported DNAinfo.com.
The company will transport cement down the river from Quebec. According to property owner Steve Smith, the ship will hold 35,000 tons of cement.
McInnis will still use trucks to deliver cement from the warehouse to customers but the new facility should decrease the trucking situation in the borough. “We’ve done a pretty thorough analysis of the trucking effect in the local community and, in general, we believe that trucking will go down,” said Jim Braselton, senior vice president of sales, marketing and logistics at McInnis Cement.
The company estimates the amount of miles traveled by cement trucks in the Bronx will drop from roughly 96,000 to 73,000, while the amount of miles traveled in New York City will drop from about 340,000 to 216,000, Braselton said.
As part of the project, McInnis plans to build a pedestrian pathway on the waterfront along Oak Point Avenue between 149th Street and Barry Street. McInnis aims to break ground on the project by the end of the summer with completion by the end of 2016.
