The historic Clairwood racecourse, located just south of Durban, has completed its transformation into a logistics park, and now showcases cutting-edge innovation in storage, transshipment and distribution, says Fortress Logistics national leasing manager Grant Lewington.

The R4.5-billion Clairwood Logistics Park is considered a “world-class site” and hosts new road infrastructure, to the value of R150-million, alongside new services connections such as power, water and sewage.

Stormwater management systems were also completely overhauled, and the rezoning of the site also required environmental provisions necessitating the retention of wetland elements protecting existing fauna and flora, Lewington said in a statement on June 28.

The 360 000 m² park is one of Fortress’s development of individual pockets, which has been driven almost entirely by client needs as “tenants respond to the rapidly evolving demands of a logistics sector impacted by the Covid-19 epidemic and increasing e-commerce".

In 2018, Pocket 1, for example, saw 25 000 m² of space leased and customised for Sammar Investments, a storage and distribution service dealing largely with Sasol products.

Pockets 4A and 4C were being developed as a 48 000 m² speculative facility when an approach from African Sugar logistics saw the rapid customisation of 34 000 m² of this space in January.

The remainder of Pockets 4B and 4C, totalling 14 000 m², was recently leased to Super Group.  

Fortress has also started the construction of smaller units on spec in response to market demand. Four mini-warehouses of about 3 500 m² each are due for completion in September.

Lewington said Clairwood’s proximity to the Port of Durban has uniquely impacted its evolution and innovation from a logistics perspective, especially its ability to handle containerised cargo.

The development of a 56 000 m² container terminal within Clairwood for Kings Rest, to be completed in September, will extend the ability of King Rest’s existing container facility within the Port of Durban.

Fortress’s advanced negotiations with State-owned Transnet to incorporate and develop an adjacent rail siding into the Clairwood complex will add an important rail capability to the hub.

Having an on-site containerisation facility within the Clairwood offering, as well as potentially dual road and rail capacity, will provide “tenants a competitive edge when it comes to transshipment speed, price and reach anywhere in the country – or Southern Africa,” explained Lewington. 

In addition, all roofing is built to accommodate solar panels for independent electricity supply.  

“It is the co-location of so many capabilities, modalities, services, and options into a single location that makes state-of-the-art logistics hubs like Clairwood so attractive to tenants,” Lewington enthused.

He noted that “Fortress’s philosophy to create privately owned logistics parks is bearing fruit as a variety of tenants are attracted to environments that are not only world-class but also provide peace of mind that park infrastructure is secure, efficient and well maintained – purpose-built to provide a critical logistics edge in the new economy”.

Clairwood today represents the kind of growth that can be created by responding innovatively to client disruption, he further said.

Fortress's entire vision and strategy to build a two-thirds logistics and one-third defensive rural retail portfolio is in response to the transformation of logistics and retail in an age of e-commerce.