Calling the proposed UPS distribution center “a showcase” and the first of its kind in the country, Robert Duval, president of civil engineering firm TFM, brought the project to the Conservation Commission last week.
The UPS site is on an as yet unbuilt portion of Pettengill Road. The developer will build about 1,500 feet of Pettengill Road, from Raymond Wieczorek Drive to a round-about at Roundstone Drive that will accommodate future road expansion.
“What we have here is a 600,000-square-foot distribution facility that’s being built by Prologis as the developer and owner for UPS,” Duval said. “UPS is providing supply chain solutions – managing the inventory and the warehousing and vendors for Pratt & Whitney, to supply Pratt & Whitney with their needs for their manufacturing plants located in Connecticut, Maine, Canada and as far south as Florida.”
He said given that the facility is intended for use by Pratt & Whitney, “there won’t be a building full of Christmas packages with a lot of trucks coming in and out.
“This is for ‘just in time’ shipping of inventory for an aerospace user,” Duval said.
“This is a bit of a showcase for UPS,” he added. “It’s the first of its kind in the country and one of only a few in the world, so they will be bringing a lot of people into the facility to see how it works and to show off the service that they are providing for customers. And as a result, a lot of people are going to be coming into the Manchester-Boston Regional Airport. They’re going to be seeing the airport, Londonderry and the state of New Hampshire. It’s really a good thing for the state as a whole.”
Duval said the facility will be located right next to the proposed FedEx center that is being constructed.
“There will be truck docks on either side and it will employ 125 people in the beginning, with a total of around 250 when completed. There’s parking for about 250 or so and there’s office space in the front corner,” Duval added.
In the approximately 45-acre site, an approximately 20,000-square-foot finger of wetland comes off the FedEx property.
“FedEx is filling the upper piece of the wetland and there’s a bit of it in the future public road that goes between the two sites,” Duval said. “The rest of it runs down hill across the UPS (property) and peters out because the soils are very permeable.”
He said three other smaller wetland sites are depressions in the land that collect water, which enters the soil and dries out.
“The total impact is somewhere on the order of 30,000 square feet or so. We have mapped the wetlands and we know what we’re dealing with there,” he said.
Chairman Deb Lievens said she gathered that the wetlands were small enough that there was no buffer impact on them.
Duval said the wetlands itself was larger than a half acre and would have a buffer.
Lievens asked about the planned road between FedEx and UPS and said it would cause more impact to that wetland.”
“The land underneath the road is being dedicated to the town, half by the landowner, the King family, and half by the other landowner, Mr. Nash,” Duval said.
Greydon Sargent, vice president of Prologis and development manager, said the building is designed to house two businesses at a future time, with parking at each end.
He said a firewall divides the building in half, which was required by the insurance company but also facilitates the division of the building to accommodate two businesses. “What we’re trying to do is plan for that in the future,” Sargent said.
Duval said that the building will be a LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) certified building.
Commissioner Mike Speltz reminded everyone that the town has a requirement for a wildlife study survey to be done, based on its alteration of terrain permit for the approval of Pettengill Road.
Attorney Ari Pollack said the state was well aware of the requirement and that it was a big part of the discussion during the site visit.
“What was the outcome?” Speltz asked.
“We’re working it out with Fish and Game. It’s an evolving discussion,” Pollack said.
Duval added that they are doing a wildlife study for the UPS site.
Speltz said that there were two areas he was interested in – aquifer mapping and the results of the wildlife study.
Duval said that they hoped to be on the June agenda and if they didn’t have an application before the Planning Board by then, it would follow shortly thereafter.
Duval asked the commissioners to let him know of any concerns, as they wanted to “fast track” the project.