Toll Group have officially opened its new $170 million express facility, which it reckons is the largest express parcel freight depot in Australia. Ian Macfarlane, Federal Minister for Industry, Brian Kruger, Toll Group Managing Director along with Rodney Johnston, Toll IPEC Executive General Manager were on hand to open the new facility in Bungarribee in Sydney’s North West.
The facility covers a massive 53,000 square metres and has been custom-built for Toll on an 18-hectare site specifically for express road freight specialists Toll IPEC. The site is in close proximity to the key transport routes with quick access to Sydney and
the routes across Australia.
“The facility allows for greater segregation of forklifts and pedestrians, reducing the need to share space on the floor,” said Johnston. “The entire facility has a much stronger traffic management plan than in previous depots, due to key design initiatives relating to freight profile, truck type and traffic flow. This will help us to maintain our capacity at peak times.
“For our freight handlers, the chutes have been redesigned to allow for easier lifting and manoeuvring. And lastly, we have implemented scissor-lifts to prevent injuries while unloading pallets.”
These new systems and working practices devised and designed into the new site will give it the capacity to handle 35,000 parcels per hour. The new site at Bungarribee lies close to the industrial/freight area of Arndell Park as well as the junction of the East/West M4 motorway and the M7, which connects the Hume Highway to the Pacific Highway across Sydney.
“The selection of this site was not an accident – it is a testament to the hard work of some of the best minds in the logistics industry,” said Kruger. “This facility itself is key to consolidating Toll’s position as a leading provider of logistics services and in growing our extensive national distribution network over the next 20 years and beyond.”
“This new facility will be home to around 600 employees, currently spread across four sites in Moorebank, Homebush and Bankstown, and provides the ability to grow these numbers as capacity increases. In this site’s construction phase, more than 200 full-time equivalent jobs have been created and I congratulate and thank the people who were a part of building this impressive facility.”