When Clinton, Iowa, business leaders developed the Lincolnway Industrial Rail & Air over two decades ago, 2025 was the dream year they had in mind. 2025 is also why in April 2022, Andy Sokolovich and board members created Grow Clinton from merging multiple organizations.
Why is 2025 a banner year so far? Usually you hear economic development is a marathon. And that is often the case for a particular project. However, on the whole, 2025 has been running wind sprints. Working with the State of Iowa and Quad Cities Chamber of Commerce, Grow Clinton has answered a breathtaking number of requests for information all the while seeing existing projects take shape.
Atlas Roofing Corporation finally feels real for the general public, as they can see the progress of the vertical infrastructure. Countless local contractors have been building up the vertical infrastructure, while the internal plant operations are mobilizing. Atlas has rented the former chamber of commerce office to serve as, among other things, home to human resources.
Around Atlas, the Lincolnway Industrial Rail & Airpark continues to evolve and develop. Project MG no longer needs a code name. Hobo Renewable Energy is looking at 121 acres to create their sustainable aviation fuel factory. A local transload facility, Super 8 Logistics, has purchased acreage in the Railpark and plans to construct a 100,000-square-foot warehouse in 2025. They have growth plans as well to take advantage of the rail. We are looking at heavy rail and truck traffic developing over the next five years. This is already attracting additional entrepreneurial ventures.
Speaking of rail, the City of Clinton has sent out a RFP for a switchyard company to run railcars in the park. Outside of available 130 acres in the southeast corner, the Railpark needed to expand, and working with our partner Iowa Land & Building, we have been adding additional certified acres and optioned land to the footprint.
We need these additional acres because we continue to field a record number of proposals. Every week, we are working with our regional partners, utility partners, and the City of Clinton to build in Clinton. These have resulted in multiple site visits.
Around the park we are also working on multiple development projects like Project Saturday River and another project. Both of these projects have optioned land. We use codenames because we are under a nondisclosure.
Then in our Business & Technology Park, Adcraft’s vertical infrastructure shell is erected. From Mill Creek Parkway, you can see the last touches to Nestle’s Automated Storage Retrieval System. On the other side of Nestle, Manufacturing Drive construction has begun. And this is just the industrial development that is happening in Clinton, Iowa.
(Matt Parbs is the vice president of community and economic development for Grow Clinton. He can be reached at [email protected].)
