Warehouses have become PA’s biggest cash crop – for better and worse

In a state known for its dense forests and abundant farmland, another topographical feature is increasingly visible nowadays: warehouses.

The rise of e-commerce globally has had a tangible impact across the state, as Pennsylvania has seen its logistics sector and warehouses proliferate where crops once grew, creating jobs and, at times, leading to additional development and generating concern from impacted communities.

In 2016, The Wall Street Journal declared that Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley region was experiencing a “surge” in warehouse development powered by consumers’ continuing shift toward online transactions. Meanwhile, Site Selection magazine gave Pennsylvania an “A” grade for logistics industry health in September 2019 – a grade given to just five other states: Texas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky and Ohio. And in 2021, The New York Times observed that Pennsylvania’s newest crop was … warehouses.

E-commerce Evolution

Much of Pennsylvania’s development dominance is driven by the state’s unique location, as well as its infrastructure. The state Department of Community and Economic Development lists Pennsylvania’s transportation network as a major reason for logistics companies to plant roots in Pennsylvania, citing the state’s 120,000-mile highway network, as well as its 64 railroads, three major ports and six international airports. 

Other factors have also contributed to the state’s rise as a logistics heavyweight. The same Wall Street Journal piece spotlighting the Lehigh Valley also noted that other areas of the state, including regions surrounding Harrisburg and York, became popular for warehouses thanks to “light zoning restrictions, access to several large city population centers and ample cheap land to build on.” 

Moira Conway, a professor of geography at Kutztown University of Pennsylvania whose research has focused on warehousing and e-commerce, told City & State that a confluence of factors make Pennsylvania a target for warehouse development. 

“Particularly in Southeastern Pennsylvania – this area is very close to a big portion of the U.S. population. It's within an eight-hour drive of the whole eastern seaboard and all of the major cities there,” Conway said, adding that the cost of land is another major factor why the southeastern part of the state has seen more warehouses pop up. “The land is a lot lower-cost than when you get closer to the city, so the area that has lower-cost land … good accessibility in terms of time, with the highways and infrastructure that allows them to get there, makes it an attractive place for the warehouses.”

A June 2024 report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics found that the transportation and warehousing industry accounts for 5% of all private sector jobs in the United States. 

And in 2023, according to the BLS, warehouse and storage jobs were 1.66 times more concentrated in Pennsylvania than the rest of the nation, with Nevada, Delaware, Mississippi, Indiana and Kentucky the only states that have a higher concentration of warehouse jobs than the commonwealth.

The growth of warehouses and other logistics facilities across the United States can be largely credited to a shift in retail shopping trends, as consumers have opted for online shopping over in-person retail settings.

But even prior to the pandemic, Pennsylvania’s role as a keystone for the logistics industry had been well established. 

In 2018, FedEx Ground opened an 850,000-square-foot distribution hub in the Lehigh Valley region that employs 1,000 workers and can process 45,000 packages per hour. At the time of the facility’s opening, Scott Burns, a senior vice president of operations at FedEx Ground, said the hub would add to the company’s operations in Harrisburg and Hagerstown, Maryland, while allowing the package delivery company to “provide faster and more reliable ground service” in the Eastern part of the United States. 

Post-pandemic, warehouses continue to sprout in communities across the commonwealth. In Centre County, Amazon recently purchased a 122,000-square-foot fulfillment center in Benner Township for $6.3 million. 

Centre County Commissioner Mark Higgins told City & State that the Amazon facility drew a mix of responses from community members, but noted that the jobs created by the project could offset some job losses created by the closures of two state prisons in the area, although the warehouse jobs likely won’t have the same wages and benefits provided by state prison jobs.

“We’re happy to have a couple hundred extra jobs in the community. Now, since it’s a warehouse facility, we might only get roughly one spin-off job for every job created. But we’re about to lose 892 jobs. So if we could get a couple hundred new jobs plus a couple hundred more spin-off jobs – I mean, we’ll take it,” he said.

The Benner Township facility will be a last-mile delivery station, adding to the 20 existing Amazon delivery stations in Pennsylvania.

“We're excited to launch our first delivery station in Happy Valley – which will support our efforts to provide fast delivery and great service to local customers in the area,” a spokesperson for Amazon told City & State. “Construction is still in the early stages, but as we progress towards launching this facility, we’ll work with our great local partners to keep the community apprised of updates, hiring initiatives, and more.”

The company also has 23 fulfillment and sortation centers in the commonwealth, and has invested a total of $26 billion in infrastructure and employee compensation in the state since 2010, with the company employing 31,000 people in Pennsylvania as of January 2024. 

Higgins said Centre County hasn’t seen the kind of dramatic warehouse growth experienced by other areas such as the greater Lehigh Valley and Harrisburg areas. “I think, for us, we’re not necessarily a target for warehouse companies. I mean, yes, we’re at the intersection of I-99 and I-80. But the total county population isn’t even 160,000.”

Higgins added that it’s normal for communities to have mixed, or even negative, responses to the development of warehouses and other logistics buildings in their neighborhood – as was the case with the development of the Amazon warehouse in Centre County.

“There’s two sides to every story, and people who have concerns about a warehouse – even a smaller one like this – definitely also have a leg to stand on,” he said.

Warehouse Worries

The age of Amazon and online retailers has led to the e-commerce boom, but the resulting warehouses can also create headaches in the communities in which they’re built.

The last several years have seen Pennsylvanians organize and mount opposition to an array of industrial projects taking place in their neighborhoods. In Cumberland County, residents have expressed worries about the light pollution and noise that could emanate from a 1.2-million-square-foot warehouse in Silver Spring Township known as the Trindle Spring Trade Center. Concerned residents have launched a website and fielded donations for legal efforts to fight the warehouse – something that has become commonplace in other Pennsylvania communities bracing for industrial projects. 

Similarly, in Berks County, a 700,000-square-foot warehouse proposed for Cumru Township located along Route 10 has left many residents apprehensive about what it could mean for their quality of life. 

Glenn Emery, a Flying Hills resident opposed to the warehouse development, told City & State that residents’ chief concerns about the project are increased tractor-trailer traffic, noise and light pollution. ”The community is concerned about the traffic, the pollution – the light pollution, the noise next to a community of 3,500 people,” he said. “Now, all of a sudden, we’re going to have to deal with these trucks.

“The effect on the traffic patterns is dangerous and it’s ill-advised. I would say that’s the key problem that the community has, in general, what happens when a building like that – an industrial facility like that – is built next to your community,” he added. 

PennFuture, a statewide environmental advocacy organization, has sought to help residents worried about warehouses by putting together a model zoning ordinance and guide to the development of logistics facilities like warehouses, distribution centers and fulfillment centers. 

Brigitte Meyer, a staff attorney for PennFuture, told City & State that community concerns about logistics facilities and industrial parks are often focused on traffic, noise and the destruction of farmland or forests. 

“The main community concern is usually traffic, and then also the conversion of usually farmland or forestland into a massive featureless box, for lack of a better term,” she said, adding that light pollution, habitat destruction and water quality concerns are also common. Meyer noted that if Pennsylvania residents want to proactively address industrial projects before they happen, they should push for zoning ordinance changes at the municipal level. “Municipalities have a lot of power – your local government has a lot of power to control where these things are located and what kind of requirements they have to meet when they’re built,” she said. “The trick is they have to get these requirements in place before any specific developer shows up and submits plans. I think the thing that is most impactful for communities is to make sure that they are aware of what is permitted in the municipality – and then advocate around changing that if it’s not appropriate.”

State Rep. Joe Emrick, who represents part of Northampton County in House District 137, has sought to give Pennsylvania residents more of a say over warehouse development happening in their communities. He has sponsored bills in back-to-back legislative sessions that would amend the state’s Municipalities Planning Code to require local referendums for final approval of warehouses and distribution centers that use at least three acres of land and take up 100,000 square feet of space. 

In a co-sponsorship memo to colleagues, Emrick wrote that by allowing local voters to weigh in on warehouse proposals via referendum, his bill “ensures that major land-use decisions align with community interests and priorities.” 

In its current form, it would need to pass both chambers of the General Assembly in order to reach the governor’s desk for a signature. 

Emery, in Berks County, said residents living near the proposed facility in Cumru Township were lucky enough to find an angel investor to fund legal costs challenging the development. When asked whether he had any advice for other communities fighting development of industrial and logistics facilities, he encouraged local residents to go to municipal government meetings, raise funds for legal assistance if possible and make their voice heard. “Don’t get politics into it,” he advised. “That’s what we kept saying to people. This is not a political issue. This is a quality of life issue. Some people will try to make it a political issue, but it’s not.” 

“I never really gave a damn about going to a township meeting until this happened, and now I go to every one,” he said. “And we get people to follow us. So that’s the key – is participation.”