The City Bond Board on Tuesday approved a contract for over $3 million to start work on the latest phase of readying a site for a possible "mirror image" of the huge Chattanooga Volkswagen plant.
A massive site has already been cleared and filled behind the current VW plant.
The new work by Wright Brothers Construction will consist of loading a million cubic yards of dirt onto the site where the pad for the plant addition would be located. The load would be equivalent to the weight of a constructed auto plant, City Engineer Bill Payne said.
That massive load of dirt and rock will then be removed later to provide a stable plant site. The "flipping" process will also aid in drying out the base for the plant, it was stated.
With the production of the Passat at Chattanooga proving a big success, there has been discussion of adding a new VW line here.
Also, city officials told members of the Bond Board that almost all of the $229.8 million pledged by the state, city and county for readying the VW site has been spent.
That includes an initial $79.6 million state grant, a second $70 million state expenditure, $40 million split by the city and county, $200,000 to build a temporary visitor center and $40 million in state funds for a worker training center.
The city and county have pledged another $6 million for a permanent visitor center near the exit on I-75.
There was also a $1.5 million state Work Force grant. Officials said $250,000 of that amount will be used to pay personnel who lead tours of the plant site.
There have been 150 contracts involved in the work.