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Timmins awarded funding for industrial rail park

It may have arrived just in time for April Fools’ Day, but a funding announcement of close to $2.5 million for Timmins’ new industrial rail park was no joke.
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Counc. Walter Wawrzaszek, Counc. Joe Campbell, Christy Marinig, CEO of the Timmins Econonmic Development Corp., Northern Development Minister Michael Gravelle, Counc. Rick Dubeau, and Mayor Steve Black.

It may have arrived just in time for April Fools’ Day, but a funding announcement of close to $2.5 million for Timmins’ new industrial rail park was no joke.

On March 31, the province announced it was providing the city with $2,485,650 from the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corp. to help complete water, road and hydro upgrades, as well as the construction of a rail spur, for the 36-acre industrial park in the east end of the city.

Timmins Mayor Steve Black said the work had been some time in the making.

“Our economic development group, staff at Ministry of Northern Development and Mines, Ontario Northland Transportation Commission, and all our provincial partners have been working really well together to get the provincial support there,” he said.

“Almost two and a half million dollars of funding to help establish that park is great news for the city of Timmins and job and growth opportunities going forward.”

The city has committed $500,000 to the project, and has applied to FedNor for an additional $2.5 million to round out the cost of the park’s development.

The anchor tenant for the park, Texas-headquartered Calabrian Corp., announced last October it was setting up shop in the city, and it’s well on its way to building its liquid sulphur dioxide plant, which will cater to the mining, paper, and water treatment industries.

In mining, liquid sulphur dioxide is used to destroy the cyanide that’s commonly used in a process to extract gold from ore.

The industrial park’s rail spur line is being constructed in direct response to Calabrian, which said having rail access was a key factor in deciding to move its plant to Timmins.

Black said much of the prep work is already finished and was done in conjunction with the other partners while the city waited for a land transfer sale to close. But planning is now fully underway and construction will begin this building season.

How, or if, the 36-acre site will be divided up into parcels for prospective tenants will depend on work being done in the next little while. The city’s Economic Development Corp. is in ongoing discussions with Chinese group Jiangsu Tianlong Continuous Basalt Fiber Co., Ltd. to potentially set up a rock wool insulation facility in the industrial park.

The City of Timmins signed a letter of intent to work with the Chinese firm last spring, following an introduction at the annual conference hosted in Toronto by the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada.

“If that goes ahead, they may use up a good chunk of the remainder of space in the industrial rail park,” Black said.

“So we may be looking to either expand the park or develop another industrial rail park in the future if that is successful.”

Black said the company is currently working its way through the approvals process in China, which would permit them to take their finances outside the country. He estimated talks with the firm could resume by late summer or early fall.

With Glencore’s Kidd Creek facility slated to close by 2021, Dome Mine closing in July, and Hollinger Mine scheduled to cease operations within three years, the City of Timmins has directed its Economic Development Corp. to seek out new investment and industry to the city.