Pallets in Crittenden County, AR

BOX 01West Memphis and Marion

West Memphis is the larger city, a distribution and assembly hub with a city-owned port. Marion is 11 miles from Memphis and holds Union Pacific's 600-acre intermodal facility to the west and a BNSF yard in the city.

Between them the two cities combine every mode on one side of the river. A pallet pile here may have arrived by train, in a container, on a barge or on a truck, and each has its own pallets.

BOX 02The bridge and the line

The Hernando de Soto Bridge carries I-40 from West Memphis to Memphis. Trucks that cross it reach the airport district and the Southeast belt, and trucks that do not stay on the Arkansas side. A request should say which side the pallets sit on and whether they need to cross.

Related: river port and heavy goods and intermodal and rail.

BOX 03Rail, road and river on one side of the water

The county's freight has three modes within a few miles, and each has its own pallets. West Memphis has road and port; Marion has the intermodal yards. A request should say which it is closest to.

BOX 04Which side of the river to name

A building in Crittenden County is in Arkansas, but its freight often serves Tennessee customers. A request should name the Arkansas address and say if the load could be taken to Memphis. Some buyers are used to crossing the bridge and others are not.

BOX 05Reaching the Tennessee side

Three crossings of the Mississippi matter to freight here: the Hernando de Soto Bridge carrying I-40, the older bridge carrying I-55, and the rail bridges. A request can say whether a Tennessee buyer is acceptable.

BOX 06A pair of cities with different jobs

West Memphis is the commercial and distribution city, with a downtown, a port and several large buildings. Marion is the residential and intermodal one, with a smaller commercial core and the yards on its edge. Pallets in West Memphis come mostly from distribution; pallets in Marion come mostly from container handling.

BOX 07Port and airport in the same view

West Memphis has its own municipal airport for general aviation, according to the Marion article, and shares a river port with the county. The International Port of Memphis lies across the river. For pallets, the useful point is that trucks, trains and barges all meet on this side, and each leaves its own kind of pile.

BOX 08Population and scale

West Memphis had 24,520 residents at the 2020 census and Marion 13,752, which together make Crittenden County the smallest of the five by freight count but not by importance. Both figures come from the cities' Wikipedia articles, with later estimates of 23,336 and 13,378.

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