The people's voice of reason
The people's voice of reason
Alabama’s economic story is rooted in movement—of people, products, ideas, and capital. From automotive and aerospace to forest products, chemicals, logistics, and shipbuilding, our state’s competitive edge depends on whether suppliers can reach customers reliably, workers can reach jobs quickly, and communities can deliver the utilities and digital capacity modern firms require. Smart infrastructure investment is the backbone of all three. It is a compounding asset that lifts productivity, widens labor sheds, lowers risk, and signals to prospective employers that Alabama is a place where projects get built and businesses can scale.
As a site selector, economic development consultant, and commercial real estate developer for office, industrial, and medical facilities, I know firsthand that clients make decisions based on speed, certainty, and operating cost.
When a company evaluates locations, the final decision often revolves around three questions:
How fast can we be up and running? Sites with pre-permitted pads, sufficient water/sewer/electric capacity, and clear truck and rail access win because they compress project timelines.
How predictable are our costs and risks? Congestion, fragile grids, flooding, and weak broadband become recurring expenses and downtime.
Can we attract and retain a quality, skilled, reliable workforce? Safe, efficient commutes, quality schools and healthcare access, and digital connectivity expand the pool of talent within 45 minutes of the plant gate.
Strategic infrastructure answers all three queries with measurable return on investment (ROI).
Alabama has strategic assets, and targeted upgrades matter. When making a site selection decision, businesses consider: ports and inland waterways, interstate and freight corridors, rail and industrial spurs, air and aerospace, energy reliability and choice, broadband and data infrastructure, and water, sewer, and stormwater.
The Port of Mobile is a growth engine for exporters and importers across the Southeast. Channel deepening, terminal modernization, and intermodal connectors (road and rail) reduce dwell times and trucking costs statewide. Inland, the Tennessee–Tombigbee Waterway links manufacturers to global markets; maintaining locks, dredging, and last-mile road bridges keeps that advantage real.
I-65, I-20/59, I-85, and I-10 form our commercial spine. Freight bottlenecks near urban interchanges and river crossings add hours and cost to supply chains. Targeted interchange redesigns, truck lanes in the heaviest segments, and intelligent transportation systems deliver immediate throughput gains without waiting on full expansions.
Many Tier-1 and Tier-2 suppliers depend on rail-served sites for bulk inputs and outbound finished goods. Public-private partnerships that upgrade shortlines, add transload capacity, and build shared-use industrial spurs unlock underused sites and reduce truck miles.
Cargo capacity and reliable passenger connections at Birmingham-Shuttlesworth, Huntsville, and Mobile support time-sensitive industries and executive travel. Runway, apron, and maintenance, repair, and operations (MRO) investments—paired with aerospace test infrastructure in North Alabama—shore up the state’s growing space and defense cluster.
Manufacturers care less about the retail rate in isolation than they do about reliability, power quality, and available capacity on day one and at expansion. Substation upgrades, redundant feeds to industrial parks, and accelerated interconnection queues are recruitment tools. Planning for industrial electrification and co-location with combined heat and power or renewable-plus-storage can reduce outage risk and help employers meet environmental, social, and governance (ESG) targets without sacrificing competitiveness.
For both rural and urban Alabama, fiber to homes, schools, and businesses is now basic economic infrastructure. Middle-mile routes that stitch counties together, redundant backhaul to industrial parks, and carrier-neutral data facilities enable advanced manufacturing, telehealth, fintech, and remote work. Every new fiber mile also increases labor force participation by bringing more households into the digital economy.
Site decisions often hinge on water availability, pressure, and industrial pretreatment capacity. Modernizing treatment plants, replacing aging mains, adding elevated storage, and hardening pump stations allow communities to promise a prospective plant what it needs—and keep promises during droughts or peak demand. Upgraded stormwater systems reduce flood risk that can shut a facility and snarl supply chains.
Retaining jobs are the cheapest jobs Alabama will ever “create.” It is important to remember that companies—not politicians—create jobs. It is the public sector’s responsibility to foster an environment conducive for business so the private sector can flourish.
Winning a new plant is newsworthy; however, keeping it and landing the next expansion is economic development’s highest return. When a company reviews global capacity, Alabama facilities that operate with fewer interruptions and predictable logistics are the ones that receive reinvestment dollars.
Site readiness can turn a “maybe” into a “yes.” A thousand-acre megasite means little if utilities, permits, and due diligence aren’t complete. A best-in-class site readiness program should include:
Environmental and geotechnical studies, wetlands and cultural clearances, and preliminary permits in hand.
Documented utility capacities (electric, gas, water, sewer), with engineered expansion paths and guaranteed delivery timelines.
Rail design and committed right-of-way or alternatives (transload plans).
Digital playbooks for each site: 3D topography, drone flyovers, and all documents in a single portal for rapid prospect review.
Every month shaved from a schedule can be worth millions to a prospect. Alabama can differentiate on speed-to-market. Consider our people infrastructure, which moves workers, not just freight. Commerce follows talent.
How the public sector can assist:
Infrastructure that shortens commutes, improves safety, and expands childcare and healthcare access increases labor force participation and retention.
Targeted road safety fixes (turn lanes, roundabouts, signal timing) can cut crash delays and injuries dramatically.
Transit and microtransit connectors in larger metros tie industrial parks to neighborhoods and training centers.
Sidewalks and “last 1,000 feet” improvements around employers reduce turnover by making shift work more reliable for workers without cars.
Broadband-enabled training allows rural residents to upskill without leaving their counties.
Continue to educate communities on the availability of SEEDS grants
How to pay for infrastructure improvements: stretch every dollar, and align every incentive.
Smart financing blends sources and rewards performance:
Leverage federal matches (transportation, broadband, water) with state and local funds to multiply impact.
Performance-based grants that tie a share of incentives to completed utility and access improvements ensure public money creates public assets.
Corridor-wide planning prioritizes choke points with the highest freight and safety ROI, not just the loudest headlines.
Design-build and progressive design-build can reduce change orders and schedule risk on complex projects.
Data transparency—publishing project dashboards with milestones and outcomes—builds public trust and keeps delivery on schedule.
Smart infrastructure investments require a long-term, strategic planning mindset. Here is how the public sector can leverage taxpayer dollars effectively:
Finish what moves the most freight: prioritize interchanges and bridges on I-65, I-20/59, I-85, and I-10 that deliver the largest minutes-saved per dollar.
Port-to-plant connectors: synchronize port capacity with rail and truck connectors to inland manufacturing centers.
Grid and water capacity at top sites: pre-fund substation, elevated water storage, and sewer upgrades at our state’s highest-ranked sites and megasites.
Rural broadband to industrial parks: ensure every target park has redundant fiber and 5G coverage; recruit data-adjacent businesses.
Resilience projects where risk is rising: flood-proof critical corridors, harden coastal assets, and deploy microgrids at large employers and hospitals.
Cradle-to-career mobility: invest in commuter reliability, CDL training pipelines, and short-course industrial certifications delivered online and on-site.
The payoff is higher productivity, broader prosperity. Every minute a truck isn’t idling, every outage avoided, every site that starts construction a quarter sooner are direct savings that flow into wages, local tax bases, and reinvestment. Smart infrastructure is the most pro-business, pro-worker policy Alabama can pursue because it reduces friction everywhere in the economy. It makes our state the predictable, low-risk, high-velocity location global companies need.
Investing in the foundations of movement—of goods, energy, water, data, and people—is how Alabama not only wins projects but keeps them. Done right, our infrastructure will be the quiet, compounding engine that powers commerce and secures Alabama’s next decade of growth.
Dr, Nicole Jones Wadsworth, PhD, MBA, MS is a site selector, economic development consultant, commercial real estate developer, and candidate for Lieutenant Governor of Alabama
Opinions expressed in the Alabama Gazette are the views of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Alabama Gazette staff or publishers.
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