WITHIN weeks, Slay Transportation Co Inc will have opened its new 20-acre terminal in Baytown, Texas. Bulk Transporter recently received a private tour of the new facility that is in the final stages of completion.
This is the third 20-acre terminal opened by the tank truck carrier since it established a presence in the Houston, Texas area 24 years ago. The other two terminals will remain open. The company has grown so much in Houston that it needs all three, according to Gary Slay, president of Slay Transportation.
“We desperately needed more room to keep up with our customers’ growing operations,” Slay says. “We had outgrown our other two locations about three years ago. Our ISO tank container work was growing so fast that we had no choice but to find additional space.
“We’re not just gaining extra space with the new terminal. We’re also much closer to a key Houston-area customer.”
With its five-bay tank trailer maintenance shop, the new terminal (at 5920 W Bay Rd in Baytown) will become the primary terminal location for the Slay Transportation’s linehaul liquid and dry bulk operations. About 60 linehaul drivers and 25 intermodal drayage drivers initially will be based at the new terminal, along with up to 150 tractors and 230 trailers.
Terminal offices and tank trailer maintenance bays occupy a 12,000-sq-ft building at the front of the property. Fifteen acres of the facility is asphalt paved and is reinforced with concrete pads to support trailer landing legs.
Two of six bays at a new state-of-the-art wash rack will be dedicated to the truck fleet operation, and the other four bays will concentrate on tank containers. Cleaning operations are fully computerized with two bays dedicated to isocyanates, two for general chemical cleaning, and two that can do either isocyanates or general chemical.
“We also have a three-bay wash rack at our Jacinto Port terminal, giving us nine tank cleaning bays across our Houston-area operation,” Slay says. “Jacinto Port will focus on tank container cleaning exclusively going forward.”
Container work
To handle the increased tank container work coming its way, Slay Transportation built a 15,000-sq-ft tank container shop at the new terminal that will employ 10 mechanics. The new terminal can accommodate roughly 800 tank containers. Total tank container storage capacity across all three Slay Transportation facilities will exceed 2,000 tank containers.
Slay Transportation opened its first Houston-area terminal in Jacinto Port along the Houston Ship Channel in 1992. In addition to the three-bay wash rack, the facility has a 5,000-ft rail siding for transloading and a 200,000-sq-ft warehouse that handles product in drums, bags, and super sacks.
Then came the location on Sheldon Rd in Channelview, Texas, that was opened in 1997. Terminal services include a 150,000-sq-ft warehouse and a maintenance shop that handled repair work on chemical customers’ ISO tank containers and Slay Transportation’s truck fleet.
These first two Slay Transportation facilities are getting a makeover that will enable them to handle more tank containers. The Jacinto Port facility will have room for 500 containers, and capacity at the Sheldon Rd terminal will range from 600 to 800 tank containers.
Sixty Slay Transportation drivers and tractors will remain at the Sheldon Rd terminal to provide private fleet service, ♦
