Connecting Youngstown to Ohio’s Next Economy

One of Youngstown’s economic problems is not simply that too few opportunities exist here. It is that our residents are remarkably disconnected from opportunities that exist elsewhere.

For a Youngstown resident without a reliable automobile, a good job two hours away might as well be twenty hours away. There is no passenger rail connection between Youngstown and Columbus capable of functioning as a commuter service, nor is there a practical public transportation system designed around getting Mahoning Valley residents to jobs in Central Ohio and bringing them home when their shifts end. Geography becomes an economic barrier, and a person’s employment market is consequently determined not only by his or her skills, ambition, and willingness to work, but by whether that person happens to own a reliable vehicle and can afford to drive hundreds of miles several times each week.

That problem is becoming increasingly consequential as Central Ohio develops into one of the most important technology and advanced-manufacturing corridors in the Midwest.

Intel is developing its Ohio One semiconductor manufacturing campus near New Albany, with more than $28 billion planned for two leading-edge semiconductor fabrication plants. The initial project is expected to create approximately 3,000 Intel jobs, 7,000 construction jobs during the buildout, and tens of thousands of additional long-term jobs throughout the supplier and support ecosystem. The campus itself occupies nearly 1,000 acres and has ultimately been designed with enough space for as many as eight semiconductor fabrication facilities and associated operations.

The opportunity extends well beyond Intel. The New Albany International Business Park has attracted semiconductor suppliers, logistics operations, data centers and other technology businesses, including operations associated with Amazon, Meta and Google. Companies such as Applied Materials, Lam Research, Ultra Clean Technology and Air Products have been identified as part of the developing semiconductor ecosystem. In August 2026, for example, global logistics company DSV announced an $85 million, 1.2-million-square-foot New Albany facility designed in part to support the semiconductor industry, bringing another 300 jobs to the area.

This raises an important question for Youngstown Forward:

How do we make sure Youngstowners can participate in this growth?

Build the Bridge Instead of Waiting for One

Youngstown Forward proposes developing a privately operated workforce transportation company connecting the Mahoning Valley with major employment centers in the Columbus–New Albany corridor.

The initial concept is deliberately straightforward. A fleet of passenger vans and small shuttle vehicles would depart from designated locations in the Youngstown area at scheduled times, travel directly to designated employment hubs in Central Ohio, and return according to schedules coordinated with the shifts of participating employers. Rather than trying to operate like a conventional intercity bus company, the service would be built around employment.

That distinction is important.

A worker does not merely need transportation to Columbus. That worker needs transportation that arrives before the beginning of a shift and is still there when the shift ends. Reliability is therefore not an amenity; it is the product.

The initial route would concentrate on the New Albany employment corridor surrounding Intel's Ohio One campus. As ridership and employer participation develop, additional stops could serve semiconductor suppliers, data centers, logistics companies, advanced manufacturers and other major employers clustered throughout Central Ohio.

The model could begin with a small number of vehicles and expand according to demonstrated demand. Riders could purchase individual trips or monthly commuter subscriptions, while employers could subsidize transportation as an employee benefit or contract directly with the company to provide workforce transportation. Workforce-development organizations and public programs could potentially subsidize transportation for qualifying participants as well.

This creates something fundamentally different from a government transportation program dependent upon permanent subsidy. The objective should be to build a viable transportation enterprise whose social value and commercial value reinforce one another.

Transportation Is Part of Workforce Development

Youngstown Forward has advocated preparing local residents for emerging fields in technology, AI, cloud computing, digital infrastructure and related industries. Training, however, solves only one portion of the workforce problem.

There is little value in telling someone that Ohio is creating thousands of new technical and advanced-manufacturing jobs if the practical means of reaching those jobs does not exist.

Workforce development therefore needs to be considered as a system. Education develops skills. Employers create demand for those skills. Transportation connects the two.

This proposal supplies that missing third component.

There is also a broader range of employment surrounding semiconductor manufacturing than the phrase "tech jobs" sometimes suggests. Intel and its surrounding ecosystem require engineers and highly specialized technical personnel, but the broader development also creates opportunities in construction, facilities, logistics, warehousing, administration, maintenance, transportation, supply-chain operations and numerous supporting services. Ohio's semiconductor strategy itself describes an ecosystem encompassing advanced materials, precision manufacturing, electronics, research, workforce training, logistics and supply-chain services.

Youngstown should be preparing residents for as many of these opportunities as realistically possible while simultaneously building the infrastructure necessary for them to reach those opportunities.

The Transportation Company Creates Youngstown Jobs, Too

There is another dimension to this proposal that deserves equal attention: the company that transports workers to jobs would itself create jobs in Youngstown.

Every route requires drivers. A larger fleet requires relief drivers, dispatchers, route coordinators, fleet supervisors, mechanics or contracted maintenance personnel, safety and compliance personnel, customer-service staff and eventually management.

Consider what happens as the operation grows from four vehicles to ten, fifteen or twenty. What begins as several driving positions can become dozens of locally based transportation jobs. Experienced drivers can advance into training, dispatch, safety supervision and fleet management. A company that exists initially to help Youngstowners reach employment elsewhere consequently becomes another Youngstown employer itself.

There is considerable potential to build a workforce pipeline around those positions. Commercial-driver training, transportation safety, fleet operations and logistics can become additional workforce-development tracks. Someone who has no interest in semiconductor fabrication or software development may nevertheless find a career driving the people who do, maintaining the vehicles that transport them, dispatching the fleet or eventually managing transportation operations.

Economic development works best when one piece of infrastructure produces opportunities around itself rather than serving only one narrow purpose.

Why This Can Be a Business, Not Simply a Program

The commercial premise rests upon solving an identifiable and recurring problem.

An employee who works in Central Ohio may need transportation three, four or five times each week. That creates recurring demand rather than occasional ridership. Monthly subscriptions can make revenue more predictable, while employer contracts can provide an additional layer of stability. Vehicles can be added as routes reach capacity rather than requiring a large fleet before the first passenger boards.

A pilot operation might begin with only two to four vehicles and a carefully selected group of workers whose schedules overlap. The company could validate actual demand, route economics, fuel consumption, driver requirements, insurance costs and achievable fares before committing substantial capital to expansion.

The longer-term business model could combine passenger subscriptions, employer-sponsored transportation contracts, workforce-development partnerships and other institutional agreements. Intel itself identifies employee transportation among the service categories potentially provided by suppliers, although participation in Intel's supplier network would of course require qualification and does not imply that Intel would contract with this proposed company.

That distinction is important for investors. The proposal does not require Intel to finance the company in order for the underlying concept to work. Intel is an anchor around which a much larger employment ecosystem is developing. The actual addressable market is the collection of employers and workers throughout the corridor.

The business can therefore be designed around diversified ridership rather than dependence upon a single corporation.

An Investment in Connectivity

For potential investors, the proposition is ultimately about an underdeveloped market for regional workforce mobility.

Youngstown sits within driving distance of several substantially larger employment markets, yet the practical connection between those labor markets remains weak. That disconnect creates an opportunity for a transportation company capable of aggregating individual commuters into economically viable routes.

The initial Youngstown–New Albany service should consequently be viewed as the first corridor rather than necessarily the final form of the business.

If the economics work, the same operating model can eventually connect Youngstown residents with employment concentrations in Cleveland, Akron, Pittsburgh and other regional markets. Different routes can serve different industries and schedules. Employer contracts can supplement consumer subscriptions. Larger vehicles can replace smaller vans on routes where passenger density warrants them.

Over time, what begins as a workforce shuttle can become a regional mobility company headquartered in Youngstown.

Economic Resurgence Requires Connectivity

Youngstown Forward's larger economic philosophy is based on a simple premise: the resurgence of Youngstown cannot depend upon waiting for someone else to recreate the economy the city once had.

We should certainly work to attract businesses, capital and employment into the Mahoning Valley. We should build technology skills locally, encourage entrepreneurship, improve infrastructure and make Youngstown increasingly competitive as a place in which businesses can invest. None of those objectives, however, requires us to pretend that the municipal boundary is also the boundary of our economic future.

A resident who lives in Youngstown, earns a strong salary in New Albany and spends much of that income at Youngstown businesses is participating in Youngstown's resurgence. A Youngstown driver earning a good living transporting that worker is participating in it. The mechanic servicing the fleet is participating in it. The local company collecting transportation revenue and employing dispatchers, drivers and managers is participating in it.

The objective is not to export Youngstown's workforce.

The objective is to expand the economic territory available to Youngstown's workforce while allowing people to continue calling the Mahoning Valley home.

That distinction gets to the heart of this proposal.

Transportation infrastructure changes the practical size of an economy. A city that is disconnected from surrounding growth is constrained by the opportunities located within its immediate boundaries. A connected city allows its residents to participate in a much larger economic geography.

Columbus and New Albany are building something significant. Intel's investment is helping anchor an expanding semiconductor, data, logistics and advanced-manufacturing ecosystem, and Ohio is investing heavily in the infrastructure and talent required to support it.

Youngstown should not watch that development from two hours away.

We should build a bridge to it.

Youngstown Forward Wants to Build the Coalition

This proposal is intended to begin that process.

We want to hear from Youngstown and Mahoning Valley residents who would consider using a reliable employment shuttle to Central Ohio, particularly those interested in technology, semiconductor, advanced-manufacturing, construction, logistics and related employment.

We also want to hear from drivers and transportation professionals interested in the employment opportunities such a company could create locally.

Most importantly, we want to begin conversations with employers, workforce organizations, transportation professionals, civic partners, entrepreneurs and potential investors who recognize the commercial and economic-development potential of connecting an underutilized workforce with one of Ohio's fastest-developing employment corridors.

The first step does not require dozens of buses or hundreds of passengers. It requires enough workers, employers, operators and capital partners to prove one corridor.

If that corridor works, we build the next one.

That is how infrastructure grows. That is how businesses grow. More importantly, it is one of the ways Youngstown can begin reconnecting itself to the economic opportunities developing around it rather than waiting for those opportunities to arrive at our doorstep.

Youngstown Forward believes mobility should become part of the Mahoning Valley's economic-development strategy. We are interested in hearing from the people who would ride it, work for it, partner with it, invest in it, or help us build it.