Anyone who’s ever sat for hours in rush-hour traffic on Interstate 95 knows where the hot spots are and how to avoid them. What you may not know, however, is how closely those traffic delays mirror the wheels of commerce; and on the East Coast of the U.S., there are no more bustling metro areas than those found in Boston, Jacksonville, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach.
An analysis of the Conway Projects Database bears this out. Suffolk County, Massachusetts, leads all counties along I-95 in total corporate facility projects gained since the beginning of 2024. Over an 18-month timeframe, this Boston area county tallied 51 projects that meet the criteria to be included in the official project database of Conway Data Inc. and Site Selection magazine.
The next three top-performing I-95 counties are in Florida: Duval (Jacksonville) is No. 2 with 39 projects, followed by Broward (Fort Lauderdale) and Palm Beach (West Palm Beach) with 37 each. Middlesex County, New Jersey, just south of New York City on I-95, is No. 5 with 36 projects. The rest of the top 10 counties, in order, are Fairfax in Virginia and Norfolk in Massachusetts (tied for No. 6 with 29 projects apiece); Fairfield and New Haven in Connecticut; and Chatham in Georgia (Savannah). A total of 658 corporate facility deals occurred along the entire length of the corridor between January 2024 and July 2025.
In terms of capital investment gleaned over the past year and a half, Stafford County, Virginia, led the way with $6 billion in total project investment. In terms of employment tied to facility deals, New London County, Connecticut, is No. 1 with 3,349 new jobs announced.
Another way to gauge trade and commerce in a metro area is to look at traffic congestion. The American Transportation Research Institute, based in Atlanta, produces an annual report titled “The Top 100 Truck Bottlenecks” in America. Along the 1,906-mile-long freeway that is I-95, stretching from U.S. 1 just south of downtown Miami north to the Houlton-Woodstock border crossing between Maine and Canada, four metro areas make the list of the 10 worst bottlenecks in the country: New York City (No. 1); Miami (No. 2); Philadelphia (No. 4); and Washington, D.C. (No. 7).
The most congested interchange in the nation, per ATRI, is the intersection of I-95 and State Road 4 near the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, New Jersey. This bottleneck claims the No. 1 distinction for the seventh year in a row, and it is the only I-95 interchange to make the top 10. A total of 18 interchanges on I-95 crack this year’s top 100 list.
Rebecca Brewster, president and CEO of ATRI, says the I-95/S.R. 4 junction earns its No. 1 ranking because “six roadways converge at that interchange to start the toll bridge over the Hudson River into New York City. Given the population densities in New York City, you have a lot of freight demand for trucks to deliver goods into the city. We look at highways that are freight-significant. We drive the data off of trucks in real-world operations. Where you have huge population densities and lots of freight, you will always have traffic congestion. Nationwide, this results in a $108 billion cost annually to the trucking industry.”
CarGurus Parks in Boston Back Bay
While Bostonians have complained about traffic for decades, one thing they are not griping about now is the economic development success of Eastern Massachusetts.
“The draw to Boston and its Suffolk neighbors remains strong,” says Peter Abair, executive director of MassEcon, the state economic development agency. “A commercial real estate building boom to feed high demand, especially for lab space, is only now running its course. Combined with the effects of the pandemic on the office market, this resulted in an increase in availabilities. For example, the lab market had a vacancy rate under 1% in 2021. More recently, with all the new space coming online, that rate has been closer to 20%.”
With developers offering favorable tenant improvement packages, Boston is now “a renters/buyer market,” says Abair. “This has caused a lot of repositioning within the market by businesses and given many new entries to Boston the best deals in two decades.”
One company taking advantage of these deals is online automotive retailer CarGurus Inc. After spending 20 years in Cambridge, Massachusetts, CarGurus celebrated the opening of its new global headquarters in Boston’s Back Bay neighborhood on October 17, 2024. The 225,000-sq.-ft. office space on the top 10 floors of a 20-story building brings together 1,000 employees who had been working in two separate offices in Cambridge.
With panoramic views of the Massachusetts Turnpike, Back Bay and other parts of Boston, workers at CarGurus now have a commanding view of Boston traffic and the many CarGurus customers who navigate it daily. That is not by accident. When IA Interior Architects designed the new workspace, they said they drew inspiration from the concept of “an epic road trip.” They wanted the new space to reflect “the idea of journey and motion,” and they incorporated those elements into the design.
Structure Tone Boston built the new headquarters space inside a brand-new office building that sits atop the Mass Pike. It is the first such project to be awarded the air rights to build directly over Interstate 90 — and it was a decade in development.
The new CarGurus headquarters overlooks Boston and surrounding Suffolk County. It is the first structure to be built atop an Interstate in the city.
CREDIT: Photo courtesy of CarGurus
Today, the LEED Gold-certified building at 1001 Boylston Street stands as one of the signature landmarks in all of Boston. CarGurus, which was founded in Cambridge in 2006 by TripAdvisor co-founder Langley Steinert, signed a 15-year lease to occupy this space. CarGurus trades on the NASDAQ exchange as CARG and has a market capitalization of $3.05 billion, making it one of Boston’s most valuable companies.
Future of Transit Finds Jacksonville
While an online car retailer engineered one of Boston’s biggest comeback wins of 2024, two mobility companies helped drive Jacksonville-Duval County to new heights along the southern end of I-95 in Northeast Florida: Holon and Otto Aviation.
Germany-based Holon announced last September that it will become the first automotive OEM to manufacture vehicles in Florida when the Benteler Group subsidiary begins assembling the first industrialized, autonomous, electric shuttles in the U.S. in 2026. The company plans to construct a $100 million, 500,000-sq.-ft. facility in Jacksonville where it will initially employ 150 workers before eventually scaling up to 1,000.
“Jacksonville has demonstrated tremendous enthusiasm for our vision from the beginning, making the city a national leader in the deployment of autonomous transit,” said Henning von Watzdorf, CEO of Holon.
The self-driving, all-electric Holon shuttle will have a top speed of 37 mph and a capacity for up to 15 passengers. The company projects that the new Duval plant, located on a 40-acre site just off Zoo Parkway, will annually produce around 5,000 vehicles to be sold worldwide. Holon said the people mover will be distributed through a collaboration between Benteler Mobility and Orlando-based Beep Inc.
Incentives helped seal the deal. The state is providing Holon with an $8 million incentive award and tax credit, while the city is offering $7.5 million in the form of a Recapture Enhanced Value (REV) grant plus a training grant of $1,000 per employee for up to 200 workers.
An analysis by the Coggin College of Business at the University of North Florida estimates that the economic impact of the project will exceed $200 million during construction and $87 million annually once the plant reaches full production by 2028.
“Holon’s decision to build this facility here has the potential to be a game-changer for Jacksonville, solidifying our leadership in the autonomous vehicle space and driving growth across multiple sectors,” said Aundra Wallace, president of JAXUSA Partnership.
According to people at JAXUSA, the Holon project was very competitive, with South Carolina and Michigan making strong runs. State and local incentives, streamlined permitting assistance, workforce training help and crafting a multi-party partnership were the difference-makers, the JAXUSA leaders said. With the Jacksonville Transportation Authority (JTA) signing on to be the first American customer to use Holon’s transporters, “that was a big draw to Holon,” according to a JAXUSA spokesperson.
Otto Makes Soft Landing at Cecil Airport
Duval reeled in its second big catch in the mobility sector on June 11, 2025, when Texas-based Otto Aviation announced that it had selected Cecil Airport for a $430 million manufacturing facility. The firm said it will build its next-generation Phantom 3500 aircraft at the site and relocate its corporate headquarters from Fort Worth, Texas, to Jacksonville.
Texas-based Otto Aviation is moving its headquarters and production to Cecil Airport in West Jacksonville, where the company will assemble the Phantom 3500 jet.
Rendering courtesy of Otto Aviation
The move came a month after the Jacksonville Aviation Authority (JAA) approved a $34.9 million package of investments and incentives for the deal. The announcement also came one day after the Jacksonville City Council approved a REV grant of up to $20 million.
Otto cemented the deal by securing a temporary lease at a former Boeing Company hangar at Cecil Airport. The new 850,000-sq.-ft. plant will be built on 80 to 100 acres of vacant land at the airfield, with construction set to begin in 2027. Combined with Otto’s plans for the east side of the airport, the project represents the largest investment and potential job creator for any new development or tenant in JAA history.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis joined Otto leaders to make the formal announcement at the Paris Air Show on June 16. The project is expected to create 389 high-skilled jobs that pay an average annual wage of $90,388. That workforce could grow to 1,200 jobs by 2040 as the company ramps up production.
Speaking at the Paris Air Show, Otto CEO Paul Touw said, “Jacksonville stood out as a city that shares our long-term vision: pushing boundaries in aerospace innovation while creating high-quality jobs and meaningful impact.” Otto’s 10-passenger midsized jet breaks convention by incorporating a sleek windowless design that maximizes laminar airflow to reduce drag and maximize fuel efficiency.
Otto’s SuperNatural Vision™ redefines the passenger experience by replacing traditional windows in the rear cabin with state-of-the-art high-definition digital displays that seamlessly integrate real-time external views.
Rendering courtesy of Otto Aviation
Adam Slepian, chief strategy officer for Otto, says, “We took on an exhaustive site search that took over a year. We looked at 55 airports across 12 states. We were looking for an airport that meets our requirements and a location that was the right place from a talent perspective. Jacksonville provided that place. It offers a great cost of doing business balanced with incentives from state and local agencies.”
“This area offers a great opportunity to provide mission-first work: Do your job and take care of your people. We know we can do that in Jacksonville.”
— Adam Slepian, Chief Strategy Officer, Otto
The more they studied airports around the country, Slepian said, the more “Jacksonville and Cecil Airport bubbled up to the top. From an engineering perspective and for front office staff, we found the requisite workers are in place.”
Duval County passed every other test too, he adds, including a quality-of-life assessment from MIT. He also cited affordable housing; arts and culture; food areas; lively downtown and beaches; and ample support for military veterans.
“This area offers a great opportunity to provide mission-first work: Do your job and take care of your people. We know we can do that in Jacksonville,” says Slepian.
Founded in California in 2008, Otto has been based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area for most of the time since. Slepian says the company will attract and hire talent from all over the country. “We will have access to talent from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, Georgia Tech and all the legacy aerospace OEMs in Florida,” he says. “And we love the military community in Jacksonville.”
A Puncher’s Chance Wins the Day
JAXUSA’s Wallace says that his organization took the lead to land Otto. “Our approach was simple: We understand what it takes to compete in the heavyweight division,” he says. “I also understood that if we hit away at certain areas of the body, we would win this project. By that, I mean that we had all the fundamentals: talent, site and quality of life. If you keep hitting at those things and make the company feel wanted, they will never feel taken for granted. We were always in a touchpoint with them from a customer service standpoint.”
JAXUSA managed Project Bluebird from start to finish, says Wallace. “We are the regional economic development organization for the seven counties of Northeast Florida. We handled all aspects of project management: finding the site; workforce coordination; incentives negotiation, etc.,” he says. “We maintained close coordination with Kelley Rendziperis [senior partner of Dallas-based Site Selection Group], who was handling site selection for Otto.”
JAXUSA coordinated all tasks with JAA, the Jacksonville Electric Authority, the City of Jacksonville and the Florida Department of Commerce. “We prepared a comprehensive proposal that covered all the bases,” adds Wallace. “It came down to three finalist sites in Florida. Cecil Airport was one of them.”
Sites in Texas and Indiana were still in the running as late as September 2024, but Florida emerged as the clear leader, says Wallace. “Of the three sites in Florida, Cecil Airport became the top one. The hangar, the 12,000-foot runway and the incentives helped close the deal, but the icing on the cake was workforce development. By aligning Otto with the University of Florida, Jacksonville University and CareerSource Northeast Florida, they knew we would provide a robust talent pipeline. Those factors, coupled with our high quality of life, are why Otto chose our region.”
