As a driver traveling west on Highway 82 exits onto Airport Road near the Golden Triangle Regional Airport, he immediately encounters miles of professionally manicured trees, shrubs and flowers lining the four-lane road.
The square, metal roofs of nearly a dozen of the largest manufacturing facilities in Mississippi dominate the horizon as the driver stops at the intersection of Airport Road and Charleigh Ford Drive.
Turning right onto Charleigh Ford Drive, the motorist passes by more rows of trimmed trees planted in freshly cut grass surrounding a large, oval-shaped sign welcoming him to the Golden Triangle Global Aerospace Park.
While only a plan now, this scene soon may be a reality in the area surrounding the GTRA, Columbus-Lowndes Development Link Chief Executive Officer Joe Higgins explained Wednesday during the Link”s quarterly luncheon at the Columbus Country Club.
“I think we can establish a brand with our industrial park. We have to try to rebrand the area west of the airport,” Higgins said as he explained the Link”s master plan for the area. “We have to change how we think about Lowndes County, Miss.
“We have a first-class industrial park, and we”re going to act like it,” Higgins added. “And we can”t just put up signs and mow the grass. We have to have professional landscaping throughout that entire area. It will paint a good picture and really help show off what we have here.”
Land and expansion
By 2013, area economic development officials plan to secure a total of 3,900 acres on all sides of the GTRA, Higgins explained. Although much of the land has already been obtained by the Link and developed, the agency will be working during the next few years to expand the industrial park west of the airport.
“Moving forward, we want to be Mississippi”s aerospace park. We want to work very hard to bring in as many aerospace companies as we can,” Higgins said. “Those aerospace giants tend to pay well and tend to be very good jobs.
“We can establish a brand with the land west of the airport and really take advantage of its proximity to the airport, an Air Force Base and a technical aerospace college like Mississippi State University,” Higgins added.
In an effort to support the county”s goal for the industrial park, Higgins and other Link officials have compiled a list of projects designed to aid economic growth in the area.
Link officials are seeking federal funding for the widening of Artesia Road from its intersection with Airport Road to its intersection with Highway 25 in Oktibbeha County, a GTRA runway expansion and a regional sewer system west of the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway.
“(Link Executive Vice President of Governmental Affairs and Business Development) Mary Cates Permenter went to Washington and got us $1 million for the environmental studies, right-of-way acquisition and final design for the widening of Artesia Road,” Higgins said. “We are talking as early as this year to get started on that. We can definitely see a day where that project will happen.
“Another project is the airport runway expansion, which will take the runway from 6,500 feet to 8,000 feet and let them fly larger planes out of here,” Higgins added. “Within two years, they will be flying on that new runway.”
GTRA officials next week plan to receive about $1 million from the federal government to design and engineer the runway extension, airport Executive Director Mike Hainsey said Tuesday. The remainder of the funding for the expected $10 million project may come from Congress later this year, Higgins said.
Regional system
Because nearly all facilities in the industrial park have their own water treatment plants or septic tanks, the Link also is planning to seek funding for a regional sewer system west of the Tenn-Tom Waterway.
“We are looking at getting funding for a regional sewer system,” Higgins said. “Everyone is kind of doing their own thing with water treatment out in the industrial park.
“I think if we could get that kind of infrastructure west of the river, it would really help us in recruiting industries in the future,” Higgins added.
Although the nation”s economy is feeling the effects of one of the worst recessions in decades, Link officials still have been recruiting nearly $1.5 billion in prospects this year, Higgins explained.
Even though Higgins was hesitant to reveal company names, he stated 16 companies are considering building in Lowndes County. If all 16 prospects chose Lowndes County, it would spell about 2,605 jobs for the area.
Prospective neighbors
However, the economy has had an effect on some projects, Higgins added. Six companies totaling 555 jobs and a $185 million investment in the county have delayed announcing where they will locate until the economy improves, he said.
Two projects, code-named Project America and Project Razorback, recently announced they would not be coming to Lowndes County. The two lost projects would have brought an estimated 1,600 new jobs and a $316 million investment to the county.
“We continue to see a lot of companies out there looking at the industrial park,” Higgins said. “We are on track to have a $300 million year this year. With a little luck, we may raise that to a $400 million year.
“That”s definitely not the best year we”ve seen,” Higgins added. “But with the way things are right now, I”d say that”s pretty good.”
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