Amazon To Build Massive Distribution Center In Churchill

CHURCHILL, PA — A huge new Amazon fulfillment and sorting center will be built on the site of the former Westinghouse Research & Technology Park visible from the Parkway East. Churchill council approved the controversial Churchill Creek project on Tuesday.

The $300 million facility will be more than four stories tall and have nearly 3 million square feet of space. By comparison, the nearby Monroeville Mall has approximately 1.4 million square feet of retail space.

Estimates are the project will create more than 1,000 jobs and generate more than $11 million annually in tax revenue.

Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald applauded the approval.

"This is going to be a substantial development, not just for Churchill, but also for the residents in all of our eastern suburbs," he said in a release. "It’s particularly exciting for these communities that haven’t seen as much growth as other areas of our county.

“This site has sat vacant for two decades but is now being brought back with potentially thousands of jobs, particularly for Woodland Hills students, allowing residents throughout those communities the benefit of economic growth.”

The Churchill Future group opposed to the project already has begun a fundraising effort to mount a legal challenge to it.

"Building this warehouse will completely destroy a 133-acre site with over 100 acres of rolling hills of green space and 1,400 mature trees," said Cathy Bordner, who started a GoFundMe page for that effort.

"This Amazon warehouse will create many health and safety hazards from air, noise and light pollution to unsafe and clogged roads. There will be an additional 5,200 vehicles, of these there will be over 335 semi-trucks entering and leaving the facility, 24/7, 365 days a year, for Churchill residents and surrounding boroughs to face."

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