Amazon plans to build a massive distribution center near the Richmond Raceway in Henrico County that will use robotic technology to help pick and sort customer orders.
The online retail giant plans to build the 650,000-square-foot robotics fulfillment center on 119 acres just north of the raceway complex, creating 1,000 jobs, Gov. Ralph Northam’s office announced Wednesday.
The multistory center should be operational by late 2022. Construction on the center has started.
“This new robotics fulfillment center in Henrico County is the latest milestone in the growing partnership between Amazon and Virginia, and reinforces our standing as both a technology hub and a leader in supply chain management,” Northam said in a statement.
Amazon’s new center will be on land at 5901 Richmond Henrico Turnpike that Richmond International Raceway Inc. sold late last month to Dallas-based Hillwood Partners’ Raceway Commerce Center Project LLC for $7.73 million, the county’s online property records show.
People are also reading…
The vacant property is north of the raceway complex along Carolina Avenue. The raceway complex had once used the property for overflow parking.
Amazon operates more than 50 robotics fulfillment centers worldwide.
The company will have robotic vehicles working alongside the 1,000 employees at the Henrico center, similar to the company’s robotics fulfillment center under construction in Suffolk where it plans to create 1,000 jobs.
That Suffolk center, announced in March 2020, will have a footprint of 822,833 square feet and will be 4½ stories tall for a total of 3.8 million square feet of space, according to the Hampton Roads Economic Development Alliance. That warehouse and a processing cross-dock center in Chesapeake are expected to open this year, the governor’s office said.
At Amazon’s robotics fulfillment centers, robotic drive units navigate around a warehouse by following a series of computerized stickers on the floor to help employees with picking, packing and shipping customer orders.
The orders are placed in bins, which are placed on a pod that looks like stackable shelving units. Rather than using traditional forklifts, the e-commerce giant uses these orange-colored robotic drive units to slide underneath a pod, lift it off the ground and then carry the pod around the center.
“At Amazon, we are investing in research and development that provides assisted and collaborative technology to extend the human reach and capability in a manner that will make tasks easier, allowing our associates to turn their abilities to more sophisticated tasks where they can add the most value,” company spokesperson Courtney Johnson said.
***
Amazon entered the Richmond area in late 2012 by opening two distribution centers, each with 1.2 million square feet of space — in the Meadowville Technology Park in Chesterfield County and another in Dinwiddie County.
Since then, Amazon has added other operations in the Richmond region and around Virginia.
In South Richmond, it operates a fulfillment and last-mile delivery center on Commerce Road just south of the Bells Road exit off Interstate 95 near the Richmond Marine Terminal. In Hanover County, Amazon leases a 328,000-square-foot building on Lakeridge Parkway in the Enterchange at Northlake business park to serve as a package-sorting facility.
The company operates 10 fulfillment and sortation centers in Virginia and three Prime Now hub distribution centers — one each in Richmond, Springfield and Virginia Beach.
Amazon employs more than 27,000 full- and part-time workers in Virginia.
The Virginia Economic Development Partnership worked with the Henrico Economic Development Authority, the Port of Virginia and the Greater Richmond Partnership to secure the project for the state. Amazon is eligible to receive benefits from the Port of Virginia Economic and Infrastructure Development Zone Grant Program as well as the Virginia Enterprise Zone Program.
“The site is an ideal location for a major e-commerce operation, and we thank the Richmond Raceway team for connecting us to Amazon and Hillwood Partners, said Henrico Supervisor Frank Thornton, who represents the Fairfield District.
***
Richmond Raceway has been on a selling spree this past month.
It sold a 30-acre property at 4300 Carolina Ave. in the Richmond Distribution Center next to the raceway complex for $7.8 million this month.
Henrico-based Lingerfelt CommonWealth Partners LLC acquired the 223,479-square-foot industrial warehouse with plans for it to undergo a multimillion-dollar renovation starting this month.
Before that sale and the sale of the 119 acres to Hillwood Partners last month, Richmond Raceway had more than 1,100 acres.
In March 2020, NASCAR announced an arrangement with Hillwood Partners to improve the value of NASCAR’s vast real estate portfolio through a repositioning or redevelopment of surplus land at its existing facilities across the U.S., including Richmond Raceway.
Hillwood Partners, which worked with Richmond Raceway to get the property at 5901 Richmond Henrico Turnpike rezoned last year, is developing the Amazon site.
Richmond Raceway also has another 123 acres on the other side of Richmond Henrico Turnpike that is undeveloped.