After nearly a year of planning and construction, Transport America says renovations are complete at its support center in North Jackson, Ohio, which the company says improves the comfort and convenience of the 200-plus drivers domiciled at the facility. The expansion and renovations at the North Jackson support center complete a series of improvements Transport America recently has made to all of its major support centers.
Upon pulling up to the facility, drivers will notice more places to park their trucks and rest between trips. By purchasing eight acres of adjacent property and converting it into parking space, Transport America says it nearly doubled the facility’s parking capacity; the support center now accommodates 140 trailers and up to 100 tractors.
The North Jackson support center is one of the company’s seven support centers around the country with full-service maintenance facilities for Transport America’s tractors and trailers, as well as those of its owner-operators; these facilities also were updated during the renovation, and two service bays also were added.
Indoors, the two-story building, which is more than 20 years old, was refurbished; showers, private lavatories and laundry facilities were updated and expanded. Additions to the building include a new recreation room for drivers, complete with a 42-inch plasma television, and a new wing of office space for support center personnel.
Transport America unveiled the center during a ribbon cutting on Oct. 10; among those in attendance were representatives from the mayor’s office and other local government officials, staff members of the facility’s architecture firm, Transport America Chief Executive Officer Mike Paxton and Chief Operating Officer Keith Klein. “Our drivers’ comfort is a big deal to us,” Paxton says. “We know our support centers are like second homes for our drivers, and we want them to feel as comfortable at our support centers as possible.”
