The latest breaking updates, delivered straight to your email inbox.

Members of the Western Arkansas Intermodal Authority (WAIA) have been planning a new intermodal port in the River Valley for more than 10 years.

On Wednesday, board members heard from Timothy Pickering, with the Office of Ports & Waterways Planning. Pickering works with public and private entities to develop freight services on America’s Marine Highway system, which includes the Arkansas River.

Pickering told board members federal grant funds could be available to help purchase land for the intermodal port.

If built, the port would utilize the river, nearby railroads and interstates to load and unload newly designed shipping vessels transporting cargo containers to and from the River Valley.

The proposed location is along the Arkansas River just a few miles outside of Van Buren in Crawford County.

"Basically, what you have right here is about two miles this way you have an off ramp of the Arkansas River. It's a slack water harbor where the water isn't running anywhere. It goes in there and pools. From where the development will be will also be the new home of I-49. We also plan to include tying in the three Class I rail that's coming out of Van Buren into this area so we can have multi modes of freight," said WAIA Executive Director Mathew Pitsch.

Pitsch told 40/29 News the port will not handle barges, but will specifically be used to load and unload ships carrying cargo containers. He said construction is currently underway on a new inland port facility at Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, where ocean vessels will be able to unload containers, which would then be shipped to other ports inland.

New shipping vessels are being developed to transport the containers on inland waterways. Pitsch said a vessel would be able to transport nearly 3,000 containers along the Mississippi River to ports that are under construction in Memphis and St. Louis. He said a smaller vessel would transport the containers to and from the intermodal port in Crawford County. Initial plans were to build a publicly owned port.

"Our plan, as told to us by previous studies, was don't raise bonds and charge taxpayers to build a public port. There are private entities that will come and build this port. You need to be the landlord and own the land, so they still function with your local companies," Pitsch said. "We have companies asking us to do this. What ends up happening to economic development? When you have lower freight costs, you have industries that want to move where the lowest freight cost happens."

When asked, Pitsch said he thinks work on the project could be underway in a year-and-a-half to two years.

Hearst Television participates in various affiliate marketing programs, which means we may get paid commissions on editorially chosen products purchased through our links to retailer sites.