Greenfield construction offers open workspace, and that's a good thing.
But contractors working on the $15 million, 400,000-sq.-ft. warehouse for RC2 Corp. in rural Rochelle, Ill., have found there can be problems, too.

Michael Murphy, senior vice president with Oak Brook-based developer CenterPoint Properties Trust, said the toy and collectibles manufacturer chose the site for its proximity to Union Pacific Railroad Corp.'s UP Global III Intermodal Facility.

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The intermodal yard is less than a mile from the project, which is the first ever in the CenterPoint Intermodal Center industrial development.

"This [warehouse] site was previously a 362-acre farm," Murphy said. "We rezoned the site and annexed it to the city of Rochelle and then began our onsite infrastructure and work on the building."

Coming to grips with the site was the first order of business for the design build/team at FCL Builders of northwest suburban Itasca.

Dealing with Prairie Soil

"The soil was our biggest issue," said Chris Paxson, senior project manager/partner with FCL. "The soil in this area contains a lot of silt, which retains a lot water." He added that a number of low-lying areas on the site had retained a lot of water over time. Intermingled with the silty areas were areas of bedrock.

"Our biggest concern was how to design the site, how to lay it out," he said.
Paxson said that geologic and soil testing located the worst soil patches and the areas of bedrock.

"You want to define where those areas are so you are not blasting through bedrock," he said, adding that it took about six months to develop a site plan that placed the required elements - structures, roads, utilities and a stormwater retention pond - into the most advantageous spots.

Reworking the site design meant delays in some of the infrastructure elements of the development.

"There is an intersection involved that has been changed several times as we have made design changes," Paxson said. The Illinois Department of Transportation had to OK the intersection, but until the site plan was finalized, there was no plan to submit.

"This goes back to the soil issue again," Paxson said.

He said although the building itself is straightforward - a warehouse structure with about 5,000 sq. ft. of office space - just getting the pad poured was a hurdle because of the soil conditions. Construction began in June, just at the onset of several weeks of uncommonly wet weather.

"We were constantly struggling with moist material," Paxson said. "If this stuff is dry, it's fine to build on, but in wet weather it soaks up water like a sponge and then it turns to slop and doesn't dry out easily. What was supposed to take us a few weeks took three months because of the weather."

He said that all workers could do was wait for the soil to finally dry out before they could proceed.

Crews were able to begin pouring concrete in August. Murphy said the building is on target to be turned over to RC2 in January.

Know Thy Site

CenterPoint Properties knew before work began that soil was likely to be an issue. The firm had developed the nearby Global III Facility on similar soil, so it budgeted both time and money for soil issues.

"We went in with our eyes wide open and a good sense of the site," Murphy said. "Initially, we had looked at doing retention ponds on a per-building basis, where we could effectively build the ponds along with the buildings and gain some economies there."

That plan was scrapped early when CenterPoint realized that because of watershed issues, it made more sense to build a single detention pond that would serve about 90 percent of future development on the site, Murphy added.

"A single pond could capture a higher quantity of rainwater and ultimately control its run downstream," he said.

Although the up-front expense was greater than it would have been to create ponds in a per-building basis, the situation proved beneficial.

"Creating one 40-acre pond ultimately created more net usable land for us and a more efficient configuration of infrastructure than the per-building plan," Murphy added.

He said that in the end, the site concerns cost less than originally estimated.

Being a Good Neighbor

Turning a 362-acre farm into a bustling warehouse and distribution development requires more than just sitework and infrastructure. It requires communication, careful planning and sensitivity to the needs and issues that the project raises in the surrounding community.

"It was important to everyone that this community maintain its historic roots," Murphy said. "We have been working with them on landscaping and setbacks." He added that taking community leaders to see other CenterPoint developments helped create an understanding of the kind of project they could expect to see.

Although the RC2 facility is the first to go into the new development, Murphy predicted that this area will "take off" in the next five to eight years.

He said that RC2's products are primarily made in Southeast Asia. The goods currently enter the United States in Southern California and are shipped by rail to Chicago and trucked to the RC2 facility at Bolingbrook. From there they are broken down and trucked to retailers.

The location of the new RC2 warehouse near the intermodal facility cuts down on trucking costs between rail lines and the warehouse facility. The Rochelle site is also close to Interstates 90, 88, 80 and 55.

"That supply-chain management is really going to be the driver for this marketplace," Murphy said.