Interstate 40 trade corridor project kicks off in ABQ

A project aimed at improving trade by investing in new infrastructure along Interstate 40 from Southern California ports to Albuquerque has begun.

On Tuesday, Bernalillo County hosted a groundbreaking in the South Valley for phase one of the Interstate 40 TradePort Corridor, which is designed to strengthen supply chains, reduce congestion at the ports and modernize how goods move across the United States, Bernalillo County spokesperson J. Austin Munn said in a news release.

"It's been a long time coming," GLDPartners managing partner Adam Wasserman said during a news conference.

The groundbreaking comes a couple of months after the city of Albuquerque activated a defunct rail spur in the area that will enable more efficient cargo transportation to support industrial projects in the region. Bernalillo County Executive Development Officer Marcos Gonzales said the rail spur project would complement the corridor.

Corridors like this are how America moves goods and stays competitive, said Melissa Newton, U.S. Department of Transportation deputy assistant secretary of intergovernmental affairs.

"We are committed to working side by side with partners ... to ensure that federal investments move efficiently from concept to construction, from freight facility upgrades and safer highway segments to improved rail access and economic development along the corridor," she said.

Spanning about 805 miles, the corridor is being built to "function as a seamless inland extension of the Southern California seaports complex, shifting logistics activities farther east (through Kingman and Winslow, Arizona, and Albuquerque) to relieve coastal port congestion while improving the efficiency and reliability of national freight movement," Munn said.

Wasserman said 30 TradePort hubs are planned over the next 12 to 14 years, including in Amarillo, Texas, and Oklahoma City.

“It’s a huge deal because for the last 30 years we were seeing a decrease in our population and then over the last several years, we've started to see that uptick, and our goal is to create high-quality jobs to make sure that our residents and their children have a future in Winslow,” Winslow Economic Development Director Jack Fitchett said before Tuesday’s event.

The hubs will include investment zones with shovel-ready sites that will "offer competitive opportunities for new economic development investment enhanced by vastly improved market connectivity, proximity to the Southern California seaports and sector-specific supply chain efficiency," according to the I-40 TradePort Corridor website. 

In Albuquerque, the phase one location is part of the Mesa del Sol's development between Broadway and the west side of Interstate 25 (south of Desert Road). The property will become a 50-acre site for a truck mobility center, Gonzales said.

"A phase two location has not yet been negotiated; however, the current plan is that a phase two regional TradePort hub will be on the west side of Bernalillo County directly off I-40," Gonzales said in a news release.

In addition to fostering more commercial activity in the regional hubs, the project will also develop fueling stations for hydrogen- and electric-powered shipping vehicles and integrate a logistics system where, Wasserman said, "each trade port will be sort of interconnected with each other."

“It’s a system where that trade port can communicate and connect and be managed with other trade ports," he said. "Now we have an advantage for Albuquerque because the shipper in Albuquerque can understand how they can move their cargo, let’s say, to Atlanta. And if Albuquerque is better connected to Atlanta or Detroit or New York or, ultimately, overseas, we're building the latticework of Albuquerque being connected to the world and the same for Winslow and the same for Kingman.”

In 2023, the I-40 TradePort Corridor was designated a regional infrastructure accelerator by USDOT's Build America Bureau. This designation supported initial planning efforts to form a multistate coalition and establish a system template designed to be replicated nationally, Munn said.

In 2024, the project was awarded $15 million through the USDOT's Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) program to support the planning and preparation for each hub. About a year later, on May 6, 2025, the USDOT awarded Bernalillo County a $1.94 million Strengthening Mobility and Revolutionizing Transportation (SMART) grant that supported the development of an intelligent data platform designed to enable real-time monitoring, simulation and planning across I-40, Munn said.

“It’s not a stretch to say the eyes of the nation are on Bernalillo County and the I-40 trade corridor,” USDOT SMART Grant Program Director Stanley Caldwell said during a Zoom meeting Tuesday morning.

Gregory R.C. Hasman is a general assignment reporter and the Road Warrior. He can be reached at ghasman@abqjournal.com or 505-823-3820.