Chicago, The Nation’s Logistics Hub

Chicago is well known as one of the most important logistics and transportation hubs in the United States. With its superior access to all major modes of transportation and its central location and proximity to one of the largest metropolitan areas in the country it has long been a sought after location for distribution hubs.

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Image credit: Seth Anderson

Trucking Services
With 6 interstate highways that cross the region, connecting both east and west for more than 2,000 miles there are only two states in the US that have more interstate highway miles than Illinois. (California and Texas) Chicago is also conveniently located within a day’s drive of 70 percent of the country’s population making it a very common location for companies to locate their main distribution centers and is home to most of the country’s leading logistics companies in at least some capacity.

Rail Transport
Chicago is home to six of the seven major railroads and more than 50 railroads in total, accounting for a quarter of all rail traffic in the US.

Water Transport
Chicago is one of the largest inland cargo ports in the country and is the world’s third-largest handler of shipping containers (after Hong Kong and Singapore) with the Port of Chicago

Air Transport
86 million passengers and nearly 1.6 million tons of cargo pass through Chicago annually with two highly trafficked airports in O’Hare and Midway.

Warehousing and Distribution
With more than 1.3 billion square feet of warehouse property, Chicago easily has one of the largest concentrations of industrial space in the United States. As with any major metropolitan area, the costs of maintaining a physical distribution center in Chicago proper tend to be prohibitive so it is very common for companies to locate their distribution centers in the suburbs of Chicago as part of what locals call “Chicagoland.” It is also not uncommon for distribution centers to be located as far away as Indiana.

There is no question that over the years there are a number of different key cities in the US that can lay claim to being one of the most important from a logistics perspective at a particular moment in time but from a strategic level Chicago will endure as one of the top markets that just about anyone working in the logistic and supply chain function will end up engaged with at least on some level one way or another.