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Industrial park gaining tenants

3 min read
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Jerry Honaker has worked on-site for two decades, lived in the region even longer and has a financial interest in Mon River Industrial Park. But he insists his ambitions for the Allenport complex extend well beyond the personal.

“All businesses want to make a profit and reinvest,” said the general manager of Mon River Industrial Group LLC, a partnership that operates the park along the banks of the mighty Monongahela. “But we want to be a good neighbor and help the communities. We want to give skilled people who worked during the steel days an opportunity to work in the area, and their kids an opportunity, too.”

Honaker and Michelle Herron, the group’s chief financial officer, presented an update on the industrial park Friday morning at Nemacolin Country Club, during a breakfast briefing organized by the Washington County Chamber of Commerce.

Tenants are being sought for the 896,000-square-foot park, which is enormous in at least three senses. It is one of the largest industrial sites in the county; it is being marketed by one of the world’s biggest real estate firms; and it was once home of a massive employer.

Newmark Grubb Knight Frank is pitching it to manufacturers. Herron said there are three tenants thus far – Amrox, Arrow Material Services and Frac Water Resources – and a fourth, Nabors, is due.

This was where Wheeling Pittsburgh Steel, with 3,200 daily employees, operated a rolling mill for 40 years before shutting it in March 2008. Pittsburgh Steel Co. opened the mill in 1918 and ran it for 50 years before merging with Wheeling Steel Corp.

Herron said four businesses owned the site after the closure, “but were unable to do much with it.” Then in February 2012, Louis Ruscitto of Peters Township purchased it from RG Steel of Maryland for $6 million – and formed the industrial group.

“We’re happy to be developing the facility,” Herron said.

That site, mostly between the river and Route 88, actually is on 400 acres stretched across three municipalities – Allenport, Stockdale and Dunlevy. Herron and Honaker praised its geographic virtues, providing manufacturers with easy access to three modes of transportation: rail, truck and water.

The park has direct access to a Norfolk Southern main line, has a barge dock and is within 20 miles of Interstates 70 and 79 and Routes 88, 43 and 51.

Mon Valley Industrial Group has nearly 400 acres with which to work, including 102 for the main plant, zoned heavy industrial. Much of it, however, hasn’t been developed. Honaker said there are 185 acres “of agricultural land” across Route 88 and 90 acres downstream “where we’re contemplating future development.”

For Herron and Honaker, this is more than a professional venture. Herron grew up in California and is a lifelong Washington County resident. Honaker has lived in the Monongahela area for 23 years and has nurtured a family there. He also worked at Wheeling Pitt for 18 years, the last 10 as plant engineer.

They are entwined in the fabric of this region and don’t want it to unravel.

“Our immediate goal,” Honaker said, “is to fulfill customers’ needs. If they do well and make money, we do well.”

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