Gulf & Ship Island Railroad

Harrison County celebrates significant growth, return of rail service at industrial park

December 2021

The Harrison County Development Commission held a celebration of the year’s success and the significant growth seen at the Industrial Park.

“We’ve got a lot of things happening and a lot of growth,” said John “Shorty” Sneed, retiring commission board member.

Sneed is retiring from the Harrison County Development Commission after 16 years. He is happy to toot the commission’s horn about the work it has done since Hurricane Katrina, including the park’s latest addition: rail service, which was marked by a unique ribbon-cutting on Wednesday.

“Just always thought we were a second-class industrial park without rail service and I think a lot of the tenants agreed. We have about 15 tenants that are planning on using it, and three or four already using it,” Sneed said.

The park has been without rail service for more than six years after the rail line to the park became inoperable. The Harrison County Development Commission teamed up with Rock Island Rail and got it back online this spring.

The director said having the rail service will make a big difference.

“We’ve got customers now who have never used rail before. We’ve got customers who have been using rail in the past that are really glad it’s coming back, and we’ve got new customers that are coming to town talking about doing business with us because the rail is here,” said commission director Bill Lavers.

Lavers didn’t reserve his accolades solely for the rail service.

“We’re celebrating a lot of things. We’re celebrating a new street in the industrial park, the first street since 1989 that’s been built in this industrial park,” Lavers said.

Even better, five of the six lots on the street have already been sold.

When Lavers arrived four years ago, there were 200 available acres in the Intraplex Industrial Park. Now there’s only 40 left, and they’ve done it with small to medium companies.

“You know everyone thinks you should have a Toyota or a Nissan plant every time you recruit a company,” Sneed said. “Those things come few and far between. We’ve got a good mixture of people here.”

“We’re adding in, and we’ve got a lot of demand,” Lavers said. “We’ve got a lot of people coming and looking. We had three people from out of state and out of town on Tuesday to look around, so we’re active.”

Lavers said he is excited about rail service returning to the park in Gulfport as well as work going on in Long Beach.

“We’re active not only in Gulfport but in Long Beach and all of Harrison County,” Lavers said. “If you want to bring your business to Harrison County, I’m your guy, so look me up and call me.”

Rock Island Rail isn’t just running the train; it is also joining the commission in actively recruiting businesses to the park to take advantage of the new service.

“Well, we haven’t been here very long, but the business is growing, though, very quickly, and we have lots of potential business that is here. We’ve got one customer who has started loading cars here and we’ve got another customer unloading cars, a lot of cars here, and they’re going to grow their business as well now that we’re here,” said Reid Dawe, general manager of Rock Island Rail.

A train ride made for a unique treat for those in attendance Wednesday.

“I’m just tickled to death that we have a railroad back at Harrison County Industrial Park,” Sneed said.

John Fitzhugh - WLOX - Biloxi, Ms