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Photo by Savannah Schmidt
Plots of land at Glendale Farms will be torn up to complete drainage and site work.
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Photo by Savannah Schmidt
Plots of land at Glendale Farms will be torn up to complete drainage and site work.
The city of Trussville is seeking grant support for the development of 86 acres at Glendale Farms.
The Trussville City Council recently approved a resolution authorizing Mayor Buddy Choat to engage in a Site Evaluation and Economic Development Strategy grant application and a contract with Witt O’Brien’s, the consultants hired by the city to assist with the project.
The city committed to providing up to $3 million in matching SEEDS funds for the future development of Glendale Farms. SEEDS grants are funded by the state Department of Commerce.
According to Witt O’Brien’s, Trussville requested a total of $2.865 million in grant funding to support the final design and construction to transform the property into Glendale Farms Technology Park.
Specifically, the funding would be used for mass grading, drainage, utility infrastructure and the construction of a portion of a new industrial access road for the technology-related industry within the park. The proposed road would connect to the east end of a new bridge and would run northward to access the Technology Park.
Choat said this is the second time the city has applied for this type of grant, and they should know the result of the application in February. The first application was not approved.
“We did not meet enough of the criteria the first time around,” Choat said. “So, they told us what we needed to do, and it was kind of a short deadline that first time, so we went back to the drawing board and worked with some folks, worked with our grant writers and made sure we had everything they needed.”
If the grant application is approved, Choat said, the work could “quite possibly” begin in 2025. The Glendale Farms site is large and hilly.
“It’s a challenge,” Choat said. “But we have approved our plan as far as the way it’s drawn up. We had to work around some environmental issues we’ve cleared up out there. Those were a couple things we had to do between the first application that was submitted and the one we just recently submitted.”
The planned technology park site is at the north end of Glendale Farms, away from where a proposed fourth elementary school would be constructed.
“It would be more for the industrial side of it, something that would bring in jobs and create opportunities for either new companies or expanding companies to come to Trussville,” Choat said.
