Backlash to Inland Empire Warehouse Sprawl Growing

The Inland Empire has the densest as well as the tightest industrial market in the US: the overall warehouse footprint in the two-county region that stretches from the LA city limits to the Arizona border is estimated to be more than 1B SF, most of which has been filled to capacity since the end of 2021.

As industrial space for 1M SF big-box warehouses has dwindled to a diminishing number of infill sites in the western half of Inland Empire, new warehouse construction has moved to the east and to the north, where it is encountering increasing resistance from residents, city councils and environmental groups.

Warehouse moratoriums have been proposed in more than a dozen communities in the Inland Empire, with advocates citing truck traffic that has made the region a national leader in air pollution.

The latest town to join the queue lining up against industrial sector growth in the Inland Empire is Redland, a suburb of San Bernardino, which this month enacted a temporary ban on new warehouse projects.

On June 7, the Redlands City Council passed what it called an emergency ordinance to temporarily ban non-housing projects on certain properties in the city’s west end that are zoned for warehouse and industrial use.

City officials said the 45-day moratorium on new development of industrial properties south of Citrus Avenue and west of Nevada Street in Redlands will enable the city to rezone the areas to make the ban permanent.

The Redlands ordinance allows low- and moderate-income housing, defined as 12 residential units per acre and above, to be built on the properties. The area south of Redlands’ dense cluster of warehouses includes a school, park and residential property.

In Colton, CA officials initially approved a 45-day moratorium last year to conduct an evaluation of how warehouse development is impacting traffic patterns and public health. After the evaluation, the Colton City Council decided to extend the moratorium for a year.

“We’re concerned about the particulates in the air, as well as congestion and public safety issues from increased truck traffic on our streets,” Mark Tomich, Colton’s development services director, told KCET, a local TV affiliate.

Last month, the City Council extended the moratorium for a second year; it will expire in May, 2023.

The Colton moratorium prohibits the approval of new truck storage facilities, distribution, logistics and warehouse, but allows pre-existing facilities to continue operating and warehouse development applications made before the moratorium went into effect to be processed.

According to a recent report in The Sun, a local newspaper, three warehouse projects with applications that pre-dated the original moratorium in May 2021 will continue as planned.

Warehouse moratoriums also have been proposed in Chino, Jurapa Valley, Perris, Riverside and San Bernardino.

Large industrial warehouses now are proliferating eastward in the Inland Empire through the San Gorgonio Pass and into the Coachella Valley along Interstate 10. Two proposed projects would bring 3.1 million square feet of new logistics space to Banning and Beaumont, neighboring cities in the Pass that straddle I-10. 

Residents of the retirement community in Sun Lake, CA, a few miles north of Banning, have put up billboards along I-10 featuring a red stop sign and the slogan “Stop the Banning Warehouse! No more truck traffic, pollution and noise,” GlobeSt.com reported.

 Facing opposition from environmentalists concerned about the impact to air quality and desert resources, Transwestern Development Co. withdrew an application it made last year to the Palm Springs Planning Commission to build the Eastern Empire Fulfillment Center on a 148-acre site south of I-10 in Whitewater, CA.