To the Editor,

UPS will join FedEx in the trailer truck merry-go-round passing up to 80 53-footers per day through the passenger terminal roadways at T.F. Green International. Thank you Mayor Picozzi and Mike Zarum for calling this madness out with a request for a review of the FAA’s environmental assessment of the proposed air cargo facility.

The Rhode Island Airport Corporation (RIAC) Board met on October 12, 2023, to consider to lease part of the proposed South Freight Terminal Facility to UPS. FedEx carries the major burden here. Apparently UPS has decided to tag along.

I figure that based on the UPS lease numbers agreed to by RIAC, we are looking at 11 to 18 large jet freighters at PVD per day. Perhaps 18 landings with full reverse thrust and 18 roaring take-offs at all hours of the day or night.

Here is the deal as shown on the RIAC Board Meeting Agenda:

“(a) Approval to enter into a Lease and Operating Agreement between the Rhode Island Airport Corporation (RIAC) and United Parcel Service, Inc. (UPS), for the lease of 1.73+/- acres of land within the South Cargo site having a five-year lease term, with five additional five-year mutual options as defined in the agreement, generating revenue to RIAC in the initial amount of $360,515 per year, and at least $12,446,751 over the term, in substantially the form presented.”

As I understand the arrangement that FedEx has with RIAC, FedEx has put a $75 million ceiling on its cost for the warehouse space. At 7% interest rate for a lease over thirty years, the raw cost of this lease would be $6,043,980.26 per year or $181,319,407.90 for the full term.

If you take the UPS $360,515 per year for its lease and divide by 260 (five days per week), you get $1,387 per plane per day -- the UPS cost. This number is very similar to a number that I guessed at a year ago.

Now apply the $1,387 per day to the FedEx nut of $23,246 per day by dividing the FedEx nut by the UPS cost of $1,387. You get an astounding 17 planes per day or 34 operations of loud jet freighters running day and night to the six pads that RIAC is planning for.

Maybe the FedEx planes will be much fuller than the UPS planes because the FedEx planes will be carrying Boston area freight. The building may cost less than $75 million. But you come out with at least 10 FedEx planes per day or 20 operations in any case.

Plus, of course, the UPS plane.

Let's cross our fingers in hopes that the Mayor's challenge will succeed.

Richard Langseth

Warwick