Officials from the City of Hattiesburg, Forrest County and Lamar County received some welcome news on March 8, when it was announced that the United States Senate has made available $7.5 million for two major infrastructure projects: the Hall Avenue West Overpass and the Eagle One Forrest-Lamar Mega Site.
The funds come courtesy of HR 4366, which was spurred by U.S. Senators Roger Wicker and Cindy Hyde-Smith, along with Congressman Mike Ezell. Of the $7.5 million, $3 million is allocated to cover some of the remaining costs of the overpass, while $4.5 million will be used for pre-engineering work for roads and interchange improvements around the mega site.
“As we have mentioned before, post-Covid cost increases and supply chain issues increased the cost of the Hall Avenue West Overpass from a projected $13 million to $24 million,” Mayor Toby Barker wrote in a March 9 Facebook post. “Our federal (Better Utilizing Investments to Leverage Development) grant was for $13 million, and the city was on the hook for the remaining $11 million, which was slated to be taken from our use tax revenues (internet sales tax) for 2023, 2024 and part of 2025.
“This additional infusion of federal assistance means that we can use part of the 2024 and all of the 2025 use tax revenue for other major roadway projects (mainly Edwards Street), allowing those projects to move forward sooner rather than later.”
Construction on the overpass, which will connect the western portion of Hall Avenue with West Pine Street, began in August 2023.
This project will complement the Hall Avenue East Overpass project, which is being constructed over the Canadian National rail line on the east end of Hall Avenue, beginning in the East Jerusalem neighborhood at East Hardy Street and turning west before passing over the rail line and ending at Bay Street and Hall Avenue. The Hall Avenue section will consist of two lanes, a curb and gutter, a new drainage system and improvements to lighting and landscaping.
The 2,222-acre Eagle One Forrest-Lamar Mega Site, which is located between Interstate 59 and U.S. 11 in unincorporated Forrest and Lamar counties, is designed to attract new, large-scale clients to the Hub City.
The site, which is controlled by the Area Development Partnership through long-term Option to Purchase Agreements, is intended for large industrial land users considering substantial facilities requiring major capital expenditures and significant employment levels. The two counties serve as governing entities for the site through a Regional Economic Development Alliance.
The $4.5 million in funding for that project was applied for by officials from the Mississippi Department of Transportation, who will conduct environmental and preliminary engineering studies around the property’s roadways.
“So this is the engineering (that is) required to get a project ready to be constructed one day,” said Todd Jackson, executive vice president of economic development for the ADP. “We are super excited to receive support from our federal delegation of Senator Roger Wicker, Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith and Congressman Mike Ezell – all three have been extremely supportive of our efforts to further grow the economy in south Mississippi.
“So this is really because of their support of our efforts, and the efforts of our Forrest and Lamar county boards of supervisors have made to invest in that site, to try and attract a large employer to that site one day.”
The Eagle One Mega Site is strategically located 69 miles from Gulfport, 95 miles from Jackson, 99 miles from Mobile and 108 miles from New Orleans. Five Gulf of Mexico ports are located less than two hours away from the site, including the Port of Gulfport (68 miles), the Port of Bienville (95 miles), the Port of Pascagoula (97 miles), the Port of Mobile (99 miles) and the Port of New Orleans (109 miles).
Eagle One also is located within two hours of six airports, including five commercial airports. Those are Hattiesburg-Bobby L. Chain Municipal Airport (eight miles), Hattiesburg-Laurel Regional Airport (18 miles), Gulfport-Biloxi International Airport (65 miles), Mobile Regional Airport (88 miles), Jackson-Evers International Airport (98 miles) and Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport (116 miles).
“In order to eventually attract a large employer to that piece of property, the transportation, infrastructure and logistics have to be extremely well-seated to allow for not only thousands of employees to come in and out of that location, but also a lot of logistics and trucking and transportation moving materials in and out,” Jackson said. “So we will be doing the preliminary engineering to expand the interchange at Interstate 59 and Highway 11, as well as four-laning Highway 11 all the way down to the south side of the mega site.
“And then we will also be doing engineering to expand the I-59 and Highway 98 East interchange, as well as the engineering for the connection road between Highway 98 East interchange and Highway 11.”
