KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Americold today opened its $120 million cold storage Import-Export Hub at the Canadian Pacific Kansas City intermodal terminal in Kansas City, Mo., clearing the way for higher volume single-line, cross-border temperature controlled intermodal service linking the U.S. and Mexico.
“This is more than infrastructure — it’s a fully integrated solution that connects food producers to consumers faster and more efficiently,” Americold CEO George Chappelle said in a statement. “By combining our cold storage capabilities and food flow expertise with CPKC’s rail network, we’re creating a new North American cold chain that delivers real value to our customers. Simply put, we’ve unlocked a better way to move food.”
CPKC more than doubled its refrigerated container fleet with the purchase of 1,000 new reefers in 2023. The 53-foot containers were put to use on CPKC’s Mexico Midwest Express service, which links Chicago with Kansas City, Laredo, Texas, and points in Mexico. Until MMX debuted in May 2023, all cross-border perishables moves were handled by trucks, CPKC says.
The 335,000-square-foot Americold facility will ramp up volume to 600 containers per week. A similar hub is being built in Salinas Victoria, Mexico, near Monterrey.
The facility includes on-site U.S. Department of Agriculture inspections to eliminate border delays; load capacity exceeding 50,000 pounds per container; and a 300-mile service radius supporting regional food flow. It also serves as a consolidation point for longer-haul shipments, including flows from Canada to Mexico, particularly for customers facing border inefficiencies or trucking capacity challenges.
“This grand opening marks the realization of a shared vision and what is today a growing strategic collaboration delivering new rail service products to the market,” CPKC CEO Keith Creel said in a statement. “This facility is the first of many across our unrivaled North American network. By combining Americold with our secure, single-line cross-border service, we have created a new refrigerated supply chain for our customers shipping food and other temperature-controlled products across Canada, the United States, and Mexico.”
Shipments of Midwestern pork and beef will be trucked to the Kansas City facility, where they’ll be transloaded into refrigerated containers for the trip to Mexico aboard the MMX trains. They’ll return northbound with Mexican produce bound for the Midwest and Canada.
The Kansas City hub is part of a broader network of Import-Export Hubs Americold is developing to support global trade lanes and enable the fast, seamless movement of food across North America and around the world. A similar CPKC-served terminal is being built at the Port of Saint John, New Brunswick.
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