Military land at O'Hare Airport acquired by the city in 1996 for private development will finally get the international cargo center that former Mayor Richard M. Daley envisioned when he made that $104 million investment.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Monday unveiled a $200 million project that he said would create 1,200 construction jobs; 1,200 permanent on-site cargo jobs, and 10,000 regional jobs over the course of a decadelong development. The 840,000-square-foot cargo center expected to open next year will be built on 65 acres of former military land on the northeast quadrant of O'Hare.
Aeroterm LLC, the developer, will contribute $130 million to the project. An additional $62 million will come from airport funds. In March, Emanuel embraced a 10-year blueprint for revitalizing the moribund local economy that called for making Chicago a leading exporter. "This cargo facility will help us achieve the goal of doubling our exports over the next five years," he told reporters on the airfield. He acknowledged that the cargo center had been talked about since the military land was acquired by the city in 1996. "Because we are building out a runway that will be open in 2013 that can handle the big, big air cargo [jets], this is the perfect time to make an investment in the cargo capacity," he said. "With the economy stabilizing, with the pent-up demand . . . in the air cargo, import-export business, with our desire to build out this capacity - this was the time to actually take it off the shelf, freshen it up because it's core to our economic strategy as a city."
In 1996, Daley spent $104 million to acquire 359 acres of military land when the Air National Guard's 126th Air Refueling Wing moved to Downstate Belleville. United Airlines was to anchor development with an $80 million corporate headquarters on 30 acres with an option to lease 50 additional acres, but that deal fell through when the airline fell into bankruptcy.
The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, had a chilling effect on the rest of the city's plans. Aviation Commissioner Rosemarie Andolino noted that Chicago already is one of the busiest cargo hubs in the world, handling more than 1.5 million tons last year. O'Hare also is the No. 1 gateway for air imports to mainland China and a "dominant gateway" for air exports to China.
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