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Carolinks delays purchase of inland port property
By Dan McCue
Staff Writer
Carolina Linkages, the Charleston-based company that has proposed creating a system of inland ports to move cargo from the Port of Charleston to facilities in Orangeburg and in an as-yet unnamed Upstate location, has extended its option to buy a substantial piece of the real estate it needs to realize its goals.
Carolinks, as the company is more commonly known, has extended its option to close on 789 acres at the intersection of Interstate 95 and Interstate 26 by six months, Orangeburg County Development Commission Executive Director Gregg Robinson said.
“We should learn within six months whether the property will close,” Robinson said in a published interview. “We will know this year whether or not Carolinks is going to be moving forward with the purchase of that land. We are also working with them on the recruitment of new companies to that area and to help move the project faster.”
Jim Roquemore, president of Orangeburg-based SuperSod, and Ben Copeland, CEO of the Patton Seed Co., currently own the property.
Carolinks announced in January that it planned to develop an inland port to capitalize on the ever-increasing volume of Asian cargo coming into the Port of Charleston. The company has said it planned to invest between $10 million and $15 million in the development of the inland port over the next five years.
As envisioned, containers would be placed onto barges at the South Carolina State Ports Authority Wando Welch terminal and hauled to a Carolinks facility at the old Macalloy Steel plant adjacent to Shipyard Creek.
Trains and barges would then ship containers from Charleston to the Orangeburg County inland site, where cargo could be stored for distribution either further inland by rail or by trucks traveling the interstates.
The Shipyard Creek property is owned by Ashley II of Charleston, an investment partnership consisting of real estate developer/broker Robert L. Clement III, GreenHawk Partners and Cherokee Investment Partners, both of Raleigh, N.C.
Dan McCue is a staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dmccue@charlestonbusiness.com.
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