EXCLUSIVE: Large U.S. Steel Site To Be Sold To Developer

A large swath of land owned by U.S. Steel in Falls Township is expected to be sold to a development firm.

Missouri-based NorthPoint Development has come to an agreement to purchase a large section of land on the property. The sale has not closed at this time and the sale price is unknown, according to multiple sources.

Falls Township Supervisors Chairman Jeff Dence said township officials met with the developer this week, and he had a positive reaction to the introduction.

“We’re excited to see what they have planned,” he said.

NorthPoint Development, according to Dence, develops warehousing space and similar facilities for companies, including Fortune 500 firms.

U.S. Steel and NorthPoint Development did not release comment on the potential sale.

In February, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported that U.S. Steel was pitching the land to potential buyers who may be interested in the slightly more than 1,700 acres of property that formerly was known as the Fairless Works site.

U.S. Steel owns the majority of the land that makes up the Keystone Industrial Port Complex, which includes numerous industrial and manufacturing companies and the deep water international port and terminal that is operated by Kinder Morgan.

One of the selling points of the land is its potential use for industry, heavy manufacturing, and warehouses. It has easy access to CSX and Norfolk Southern rail lines, the international port, and major highways, including I-95, the New Jersey and Pennsylvania Turnpike, and Route 1. The property also sits in a key area close to Philadelphia and New York.

In recent months, rumors have swirled about the future of the site and whether it would be sold. Until the Philadelphia Inquirer story, the shopping of the property had only been whispered and even township officials were hearing the information for the first time when a reporter called for comment.

Elcon was looking to build a controversial proposed hazardous waste materials plant on a portion of the land, but they pulled out last week after years of efforts. It was unclear if the move was related to the potential sale of the land.

The Keystone Industrial Port Complex was home to many tax breaks after it was designated a Keystone Opportunity Improvement Zone in the early 2000s. Many of the tax breaks have expired or will soon come to an end.

The site is primed for redevelopment and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and state officials started efforts in the 1990s to clean up contamination of trichloroethylene, a solvent, and heavy metals found at the site, according to state and federal government documents.

The U.S. Steel site has the third largest property tax assessment in the Pennsbury School District, according to budgeting documents. The only two larger property owners were Waste Management and the firm that owns the shopping center off Oxford Valley Road across from the mall.

Opened in 1952, the U.S. Steel Fairless Works complex was home to a steel mill, a coke (fuel used in the steel making process) production plant, steel making and forging operations, a powerhouse, and chemical plant. By the 1970s, more than 5,000 people worked at the site. As the years wore on, U.S. Steel slashed thousands of positions and in 2001 closed the majority of the site. The company still finishes cold-rolled steel products made at western Pennsylvania plants for use in the automotive, home construction, appliance, and metal building industries at the facility. By 2009, about 100 U.S. Steel employees worked at the facility as the company continued demolishing buildings that were unused.

U.S. Steel did not comment about whether they planned to keep their facility at the site.

The early success of the facility helped grow the area and drew families to Bucks County. The U.S. Steel Fairless Works location was named after company executive Benjamin Franklin Fairless. He was the namesake for the Fairless Hills sections of Falls and Bristol townships.

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