Led by a rebounding housing market and growing logistics and manufacturing sectors, even with a lagging economy, Southern California remains one of the fastest growing regions in the country. So the recent announcement of the Inland SoCal Link, part of the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development’s (GoBiz) iHub program, makes perfect sense. The Inland SoCal Link is a partnership between the County of Riverside and the Port of Los Angeles with a goal to maximize opportunities within the transportation corridor linking the port with the Inland region. As a rail hub, terminal for trucks, and home to more warehousing and distribution centers than we can ever want, the Inland Empire is an important part of the country’s transportation and commerce landscape.
This iHub initiative builds on the unique history of the region, which was transformed in the 1870’s into not only an agricultural capital, but also a transportation capital when Southern Pacific Railroad declared its intention to extend tracks from Los Angeles to San Bernardino and then to Yuma, completing the transcontinental line across the Southern United States. Shortly after that announcement the rival railroad at the time California Southern fought for and won the right to cross their northbound track across Southern Pacific’s east/west tracks in Colton. By the 1880’s San Bernardino and the surrounding inland area was literally at the crossroads of the new economy.
Bolstered by the growing citrus industry, the Inland Empire became Southern California’s key transportation hub as citrus growers and shippers produced and exported more than 40,000 railroad cars full of navel oranges, lemons, grapefruit and other citrus varieties each year. I remember my uncle Dex, who to this day remains a Lionel Train hobbyist, sharing the stories of railroad executives who build stately homes in northern San Bernardino. And there are my cousins John Rodgers and Tony Banks and my uncle Gus who all spent their professional careers working for the region’s railroad companies. The railroads have been, and remain, a significant part of the inland region’s economy.
I recently spoke to my friend Louis Stewart, GoBiz’s Deputy Director of Innovation and Entrepreneurship, who is in charge of the iHub initiative on the expectations for the Inland SoCal Link. He shared with me that it would be ideal to see advances in how logistics work and the creation of a more streamlined pipeline in the logistics system. It needs to be organic, he said, and community involvement, engagement and support are critical. He cited Coachella’s iHub as an excellent example of the community getting behind the effort. The city of Palm Springs donated a building for an incubator and in-kind funding garnered matching funds that have accelerated innovation. Without the community buy-in and supporting innovation, the partnership between industry, academia, and government just doesn’t work, he explained.
This is a great opportunity for the region to build on the strengths of our past and create a sustainable vision for our future. Hopefully, with the partnership between industry, government, academia, and the community, we will once again be at the crossroads of the new economy.