Peoria Station

NOTE: I’ve been posting this series alphabetically. They’re already written, but somehow I omitted one for Hanna Steel. So I posted it tonight. In October 1997, Hanna Steel Corporation announced its intention to build a steel coil processing and coating facility, as well as a tube mill, at Pekin’s Riverway Business Park. Operations started in late [...]

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Keen Transport is a New Kingstown, Pennsylvania-based firm which specializes in hauling heavy machinery. Among others, it provides storage and transportation for Caterpillar’s three Illinois machinery assembly plants – Aurora, Decatur and East Peoria.   Although track-type tractors, pipelayers and accessories are loaded onto railcars at Caterpillar Building SS, Keen personnel are tasked with preparing [...]

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The Journal Star is reporting that Pekin may be planning to purchase additional acreage for its Riverway Business Park: In business related to the park, the council approved an amendment to the city’s comprehensive plan to accommodate future growth to the south and to the west, including vacant land for an expansion of the business [...]

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Illinois Corn Processing LLC - Pekin, Illinois, July 5, 2010 “Illinois Corn Processing LCC” is the name of a new joint venture between MGP Ingredients, Inc. and SEACOR Energy Inc. Operations began last February at the former’s Pekin distillery. A little history is necessary. American Distilling Company dated back to 1892. It survived Prohibition by producing [...]

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LEFT: Ten covered hoppers – all containing bulk wheat flour –  await unloading at TZPR’s Creve Coeur Team Track on July 27, 2009. RIGHT: Earlier, on June 8, a Carry Transit bulk truck (closest to silos) unloads wheat flour at Hostess Brands’ Peoria bakery Hostess Brands’ southside Peoria Butternut Bread bakery is at least two miles from [...]

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A westbound Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus train rolls past Grainland Co-Op’s Cruger elevator on May 27, 2009 Farmers Grain Co-Op of Eureka completed its Cruger elevator in 1965, and it has been much expanded since that time. Farmers Grain merged with Secor Elevator Co. in 1999 to form Grainland Co-Op. A year earlier, [...]

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A Tazewell & Peoria RR train switches Gavilon’s North Pekin plant on October 24, 2009. The Shade-Lohmann Bridge is seen in the background Gavilon, LLC’s North Pekin plant, served by the Tazewell & Peoria Railroad, stores dry and liquid fertilizer. It was built as a mixing facility by Tuloma Gas Products in 1966, but adopted sister Amoco’s name in 1968. Cropmate acquired the [...]

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Loaded sand hoppers wait for pickup at Galena Road Gravel Co’s Chillicothe facility on September 10, 2010 Galena Road Gravel Co. has continued the long-time Chillicothe tradition of sand and gravel mining. Its Moffit Street facility on the town’s north edge gained rail access in 1988. Served by the Iowa Interstate Railroad, Galena Road Gravel [...]

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A TP&W train services Fort Transfer on September 30, 2004 Fort Transfer Company probably saved TP&W’s Morton Industrial Spur from abandonment. In early 2002, the railroad embargoed the line due to deteriorating crossties. Business had been declining as one seasonal shipper, Nestle USA/Libby’s, increasingly shifted its canned pumpkin shipments to trucks and intermodal. Morton Buildings [...]

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The Peoria Journal Star is reporting that Greeley, Colorado-based Swift & Co. may locate at large pork processing plant at Pekin’s Riverway Business Park. I had speculated back on October 8 that a pork processor might be interested in Pekin, or other Peoria area locations. The plant would create 2,500 jobs. Best of all, the [...]

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