Canada Post unveils massive new sorting centre

by Inside Logistics Online Staff

Canada Post has taken the wraps off plans for its new parcel sorting centre in Scarborough, Ontario.

The new facility will be able to handle over a million packages a day once it opens in early 2023.

The 585,000-square-foot centre will be able to sort more than 60,000 packages per hour. That’s 50 percent more than Canada Post’s Gateway facility in Mississauga, currently the company’s largest parcel plant.

The facility will have nearly eight kilometres of conveyors. More than 90 percent of all packages will be processed through automated sorters. A package can arrive, be processed and be ready for dispatch in less than four minutes.

Serving 300 facilities

It will sort to more than 300 Canada Post facilities – more than twice as many as Gateway, and will process slightly more than half of the volume in the Greater Toronto Area; the remainder will move through Gateway.

With more than 150 dock doors, 600 trucks are expected to be in and out of the facility every day. The yard will hold more than 200 trailers,with another 100 spots for five-ton trucks.

Canada Post is spending $470 million on its development as part of plans to increase parcel capacity by more than 50 percent across its network over the next seven years to manage the demand beyond 2030.

Zero-carbon building

The facility is under construction and is expected to be operational in early 2023. It will be the corporation’s first zero-carbon building and the largest industrial project in Canada with the Zero Carbon Building Standard designation.

Rooftop solar panels will generate clean, renewable energy on site. The facility will run an efficient HVAC system and sensor-controlled lighting based on occupancy and daylight.

Ten electric vehicle charging stations will be available for employees. Infrastructure will be ready for the future electrification of Canada Post’s five-ton fleet.

The facility is named The Albert Jackson Processing Centre, after the man believed to be the first Black letter carrier in Canada, hired in 1882.