545 jobs coming this fall
A company, widely believed to be Amazon, is planning quicker delivery of packages in Fresno, bringing goods the “last mile” to your doorstep. It would be the second such last mile center Amazon has in Fresno likely allowing Amazon to do same day delivery to homes and businesses.
The new facility will be located at East Olive Avenue and North to Clovis Avenue, along Highway 180.
Phoenix-based Seefried Industrial Properties is constructing the 184,000sf “delivery station” including a 161,300-square-foot warehouse, office space totaling up to 22,000 square feet, 17 dock-high doors, and 18 grade-level doors.The center is smaller than the million square ft behemoths that Amazon operates as fulfillment centers that have plenty of storage. These smaller delivery centers move packages in and out quickly.
Construction is going to be completed in one phase, launched in September 2021, and concluding in June 2022. The proposed project is expected to be operational in the third quarter of 2022.
The developer’s application to the city says the proposed project would be occupied by a tenant with the purpose of fulfilling internet purchases. It would operate 24 hours a day/7 days a week and would employ 545 total employees over a 24-hour period for each operation, which includes on-site delivery station employees, delivery drivers, and flex employees.
The proposed delivery station would serve as a “last mile” connection between the user’s fulfillment centers and their customers, enabling a faster and more efficient means of shipping says a statement. Packages would be transported to the delivery stations via line-haul trucks (18-wheeler trailer trucks) from neighboring fulfillment/sorting centers, where they would be further sorted, picked, and loaded into small delivery vehicles (typically vans) and delivered to customers.
Delivery Drivers
The delivery operations would utilize 254 delivery employees who would commute to the delivery station daily via private vehicles. Each delivery employee would pick up their assigned delivery van, load a day’s worth of packages, make those deliveries, return to the project site, drop off the delivery van, and exit the site in personal vehicles. Delivery operations would begin at 10:00 a.m. and end at 11:30 a.m., and delivery employees would return to the delivery station between 7:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m.
Flex employees
The proposed project would also employ approximately 70 flex employees, which are private contractors who use personal vehicles for deliveries. Flex employees would be contacted via an application downloaded to a mobile device and instructed when to arrive at the delivery station where they would load vehicles and be routed to their assigned delivery zones in a similar manner to the delivery van process described above. Flex employee arrivals would be staggered, with employees arriving at the facility between 4:00 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. to load their vehicles for deliveries. These employees would not return to the delivery station at the end of their delivery shifts.