PRINT THIS STORY:

CHANGE TEXT SIZE:

Madison breaks ground

Madison Retail broke ground on Madison Pointe at Towne Lake, a 20-acre, master-planned, mixed-use community. The development will include 28,000 square feet of retail and three outparcels. Walgreens, Lee Nail Spa and a number of local restaurants have already committed. Homes by Williamscraft will design and develop 95 luxury townhouses for the project as well. Late 19th and early 20th century architecture reminiscent of old town centers will be implemented, and a natural stream running through the property will be preserved. Completion is scheduled for early summer 2007.

Oxford mall ready

The Oxford (Miss.) Galleria is getting ready for a 2008 opening. A joint venture of Germantown, Tenn.-based Trezevant Realty and Olive Branch, Miss.-based Utley Properties, the shopping center includes 61,00 square feet of specialty stores anchored by a 58,300-square-foot Belk department store, freestanding restaurants, and an 80-room hotel. The value of the project exceeds $30 million. Across the street from the new development is a Super Wal-Mart-anchored center, built by Trezevant in 2003.

Nigro expands in Vegas

Las Vegas-based Nigro Development is expanding in North Las Vegas, breaking ground on its new Park Central Plaza Shopping Center. The 27-acre site, anchored by a Wal-Mart Neighborhood Market, will have 200,000 square feet of space and is scheduled for completion in the third quarter of 2007. The $60 million center will also include a Wells Fargo Bank and Timbers Tavern. Surrounding the center are approximately 130,000 residents in a three-mile radius and more than 15,000 new homes.

Vegas gets new ’hood

Chef Roland Passot will open his first restaurant outside of the San Francisco Bay Area at The Village at Queensridge, a 29-acre, $850 million mixed-use project that will include 450,000 square feet of retail, offices and 340 condominiums. Mastro Restaurants and family entrertainment center Kidville have also signed on as anchors at the project, which is expected to open in late 2008. An affiliate of Executive Home Builders is developing the center.

WinCo anchors Visalia

Los Angeles-based Kornwasser Shopping Center Properties opened Phase I of the 203,000-square-foot Visalia (Calif.) Pavilion. Idaho-based supermarket chain WinCo Foods anchors the $25 million center, which was designed by Perkowitz + Ruth Architects and built by Quiring General. Additional tenants include Great Clips, Subway and Starbucks.

Wall Street goes Pink

Luxury shirtmaker Thomas Pink has signed on to fill the retail space at 63 Wall Street, a historic 37-level building in New York City’s financial district.Metro Loft Management redeveloped the building, once a bank, into high-end condominiums. Winick Realty Group represented Pink in the transaction.

MGHerring mixes uses

Texas-sized mixed-use developments are keeping Dallas-based MGHerring Group busy. The firm will soon make Village at Riverwatch in Augusta, Ga., part of a mixed-use center. The firm will add to the 800,000-square-foot lifestyle center hotels, restaurants and retailers new to the Augusta area. The center will be anchored by Dillard’s and Belk department stores as well as Starplex Cinemas. With new tenants coming into the mix, construction has been delayed for six to nine months, and the opening will now be in 2009. MGHerring Group also plans to develop The Village at Allen, the next component of a 400-acre mixed-use area that sits on the line of Allen and Fairview, Texas. The Village at Allen will occupy 181 acres, offering 900,000 square feet of retail with big-box tenants, specialty shops and 14 restaurants. There will also be 500,000 square feet of office space and a 250-room hotel, all scheduled to be complete in the fall of 2008. Enhancing the project will be an open-air lifestyle center to be named The Village at Fairview. The entire project will feature more than 2 million square feet of retail and 1 million square feet of office and commercial space. It will be completed in the fall of 2008 and will feature such tenants as Macy’s, Barnes & Noble and The Container Store. The Village at Allen and The Village at Fairview are a joint venture of the MGHerring Group and Newark, N.J.-based Prudential.

New life in St. Louis

St. Louis-based Gilded Age and Koman Properties are building an $80 million mixed-use development in downtown St. Louis near Lafayette Square. It will be called Georgian Square. The project will be the first mixed-use large-scale retail project developed in the Lafayette Square area in the past 100 years. Plans include four commercial office buildings, with residential units above, and 90,000 square feet of retail space. It will be tenanted by upscale retailers to target the area’s increasingly affluent population, with restaurants and a coffee purveyor also planned. City Market, a specialty grocery store, will open its first St. Louis store at the development.

Florida mall opens up

U.S. Capital Holdings, owned by Chinese steel manufacturer Gang Lu, is planning to spend about $350 million redeveloping the former Fashion Mall, in Plantation, Fla., into a mixed-use project. The plan includes indoor and outdoor retail, dining and entertainment, all to be part of the city of Plantation’s master plan for an urban town center. The developer will demolish the 650,000-square-foot enclosed portion of the mostly vacant Fashion Mall and open it outward onto a new Main Street. Upon completion, the project will include 550,000 square feet of retail, 300,000 square feet to 400,000 square feet of office space and 400 to 600 residential units. Pending approval, the first phase of the project will begin by February 2008.

Kimco’s Chile venture

Kimco Realty Corp. formed a joint venture with Patio Gestion Inmobiliaria, a retail developer in Chile, to acquire and develop shopping centers in major markets throughout Chile. In its first transaction, the venture will acquire a 50 percent stake in each of four existing properties in Chile’s capital city, Santiago. In total, these are valued at $16.2 million and measure 153,600 square feet in total, including expansion space. Kimco is already a major investor in Mexico, where it owns 29 shopping centers. The largest tenants at the Chilean centers include the Farmacias Ahumada and Farmacias Cruz Verde chains and the Cencosud and D&S supermarket chains. Kimco has targeted Chile for expansion based on that country’s high investment returns, established retail real estate market, consistent sales growth and stable government, the company says. In addition, Chile has an “A” investment rating from Standard & Poor’s and a vibrant mortgage market for financing real estate investments.

Bakersfield bound

Pasadena, Calif.-based Highland Development, a subsidiary of Marcus & Millichap, is developing an 84,500-square-foot, mixed-use project in Bakersfield, Calif. The project, to be anchored by an existing Walgreens, is set to break ground this summer for completion late this year. The development will include 13 buildings, with 40,000 square feet of restaurant and shopping space and 44,500 square feet of offices. Some 7,000 homes are being built in the surrounding area, and according to a CB Richard Ellis market report, the three-mile area around the center will have owner-occupied units accounting for 74 percent of the total housing by 2010.

Aussies buy Spirit

The interest of international investors in U.S. retail real estate is going beyond trophy properties. A group of investors led by Australia’s Macquarie Bank and Iceland’s Kaupthing Bank agreed to buy Spirit Finance Corp., a triple-net-lease REIT, for about $3.5 billion, including $1.9 billion in assumed debt. Spirit Finance, whose portfolio includes big-box and specialty stores and chain restaurants, bought Green Bay, Wis.-based ShopKo Stores’ real estate last year for $815.3 million, then entered into long-term, triple-net-lease agreements with affiliates of the operating company.

“The consortium has committed to making an equity investment in Spirit at this time by purchasing newly issued shares in the company,” said Spirit Finance CEO Christopher H. Volk. “This investment will fund our continued growth and is a significant vote of confidence in our strategic plan.” Since its launch in 2003, Spirit Finance has raised about $1 billion in four offerings and used leverage to invest $2.6 billion. The possibilities are endless for triple-net-lease deals in the U.S., says Spirit chairman Mort Fleischer. He estimates that U.S.-based corporations have some $1 trillion of single-tenant real estate sitting on their balance sheets, of which only about $20 billion is in a net-lease format. GE Capital bought Fleischer’s sale-leaseback firm, Franchise Finance Corp., for $2.1 billion in 2001.

Chino center fills up

The tenant roster is filling up at Irvine, Calif.-based Panattoni Development’s Rancho del Chino, a $90 million retail center under construction in Chino, Calif. The center signed JCPenney to lease a 103,525-square-foot store in the development. Home Depot also signed on to purchase 9.2 acres from Panattoni and will open a 106,278-square-foot store and a 34,760-square-foot garden center. Home Depot and 39,000 square feet of retail space are expected to open in January 2008, with JCPenney due to open in October of that year. The 42-acre project is also expected to include an electronics retailer, an office supply store, and additional shops and restaurants.

Mediterranean in Miss.

The Mediterranean comes to Mississippi as the Renaissance at Colony Park, an open-air lifestyle center, gets built in Ridgeland. The project, a joint venture between Jackson, Miss.-based Mattiace Properties and Ridgeland, Miss.-based H.C. Bailey Cos., will contain 500,000 square feet of retail space on 57 acres. There will be about 60 retail stores, five restaurants and some specialty food stores, plus 65,000 square feet of office space above the retail shops. The architecture will include arched openings, clay tile roofs, and stone and stucco facades. A large clock tower with a central square will feature entertainment in the evening. Committed retailers include Talbots, Ethan Allen, Barnes & Noble, Williams-Sonoma and P.F. Chang’s China Bistro Restaurant. The center has a projected opening date of March 2008.

Boston Harbor launch

Lyndhurst, Ohio-based Legacy Capital Partners and Boston-based Samuels & Associates will develop The Launch at Hingham Shipyard, on Boston Harbor’s south shore. The $62.5 million mixed-use project will include 240,000 square feet of waterfront retail, restaurants, office space and a cinema. The project will also accommodate up to 94 condominiums. Construction is scheduled to begin in June. The development is part of a larger rejuvenation of the former Hingham Shipyard, a 130-acre site that will get 235 luxury apartments and 150 luxury town homes. Sea Chain will carry on managing the Hewitts Cove Marina, and the MBTA will continue to operate the ferry, which shuttles commuters to and from Boston daily.

Lifestyle in Lake Havasu

Wolford Development plans to open the 740,000-square-foot Shops at Lake Havasu (Ariz.) in March 2008. The lifestyle center will include seven outparcels. A 100,000-square-foot Dillard’s department store and a 102,000-square-foot JCPenney will anchor the center. A Wal-Mart Supercenter is slated to be the final anchor tenant, with 201,821 square feet. More than 70 retailers will be included in the completed center in a Main Street-style town center setting.

A newer del Norte

Chattanooga, Tenn.-based CBL & Associates has a major renovation in the works for its Mall del Norte, in Laredo, Texas. Attracting a large population from Texas as well as Mexico, the 1.2 million- square-foot super-regional center has not been updated since CBL purchased it in 2004. The multi million-dollar renovation includes exterior and interior design upgrades, the addition of a 72,000-square- foot, 16-screen Cinemark, and new shops that include Anchor Blue and Aéropostale. The renovation is scheduled to be completed by November, according to the developer.

Bridge Street broadens

Santa Monica, Calif.-based O&S Holdings continues to add tenants to its mixed-use Bridge Street Town Centre currently being developed in Huntsville, Ala. A 550,000-square-foot lifestyle center, a 150,000-square-foot office tower and the 210-room Westin Hunstville Hotel are all currently under construction. The Westin will include one of the country’s first Westin Heavenly Spas. Retailers such as Kate Spade, Lucky Brand, Sigrid Olsen, Bebe and Banana Republic will open stores in the retail center. O&S Holdings says that about three-quarters of the development’s square footage is committed.

Lowe to build near L.A.

Mixed-use is heading to the Los Angeles area. Los Angeles-based Lowe Enterprises will purchase 1.8 acres of land in Azusa, Calif., outside Los Angeles, for a new mixed-use development with 32,500 square feet of retail space and 66 condominium units. An agreement was struck with the city of Azusa to redevelop and revive the city’s downtown commercial area. Much of the new mixed-use area will be pedestrian-friendly, with outdoor sidewalk dining and public plazas. The project will be designed to complement the existing distinctive architecture. Construction is expected to begin in the summer.

Neinver’s Polish center

Spanish real estate developer Neinver completed construction on Gallery Malta, a mixed-use center in Poznan, Poland. The developer spent about $168 million on the project, the biggest investment for Neinver in Poland thus far. The 1.6 million-square-foot (153,000-square-meter) center has department stores, supermarkets, a do-it-yourself home improvement store, a movie theater and a gymnasium. The company plans to construct a bridge connecting the center with a main boulevard and to reconstruct the access roads.

Charlotte center grows

StoneCrest at Piper Glen, in South Charlotte, N.C., is upgrading. The 450,000-square-foot center has added Claire’s, Nothing But Noodles and Shoe-In to its store lineup. Starbucks, Boneheads and the Flying Biscuit Café are scheduled to open in the spring of 2007. Boneheads and Flying Biscuit both provide casual dining experiences for shoppers. New parks, a fountain and additional outdoor seating will also be available at the center this spring. The center is currently anchored by Target, Borders Books, Harris Teeter and a 22-screen Regal cinema.

Reviving Riverside

The Riverside (Calif.) Plaza has completed a transformation. Owner Lake Forest, Ill.-based The Westminster Funds has redeveloped the 50-year-old property into a 475,000-square-foot lifestyle center. After a six-year process, Riverside Plaza is now more upscale, with higher-end entertainment, dining, specialty retailers, grocery anchors, a theater and a main street. Tenants include California Pizza Kitchen, Panera Bread, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Borders Books and an El Torito concept restaurant. Also included in the tenant mix are independent upscale restaurants and boutiques. The redevelopment brought an additional 35,000 square feet of retail and dining space as well as new landscaping and a trolley system for customer use. Gottschalks, which is one of the anchor department stores, says it will also partake in the redevelopment project by redecorating its store and updating its merchandise mix.

Escondido upgrade

Federal Realty Investment Trust plans to upgrade its Escondido (Calif.) Promenade. The 417,000-square-foot, 21-year-old center will get updated storefronts, enhanced landscaping and a pedestrian way-finding system that uses solar-powered lights. The project will be completed in the spring.

Quarry project planned

Embrey Partners broke ground on Quarry Village, a 425,000-square-foot, mixed-use development in San Antonio. The site is the last undeveloped land in the Lincoln Heights area of the city, situated near the Alamo Quarry Market and the Quarry Golf Club. Phase one of the project will include 280 luxury residential units with 70,000 square feet of specialty retail. Additional office and retail is planned for phase two, which will begin in early 2008. With a Tuscan design, the Village will have freestanding retail with residential above and a pedestrian Main Street. Embrey Partners, based in San Antonio, has more than 3 million square feet of residential and commercial space currently under construction.

NFL camp to be center

Development firm Opus South Corp. announced plans for a mixed-use project in Suwanee, Ga., to be named Suwanee Gateway. The former National Football League’s Atlanta Falcons training ground will turned into 360,000 square feet of retail, 580,000 square feet of office space, 340 apartment units and 138 town homes. A home improvement retailer has already committed as an anchor for the site. Also included are 14 retail outparcels, a hotel and a town center. According to Duane Wood, vice president of Opus South in Atlanta, the company had been interested in the developing the area for more than four years. Opus expects to begin work by this summer and will break ground shortly after.

JV in Germantown

The Oxford (Miss.) Galleria is getting ready for a 2008 opening. A joint venture of Germantown, Tenn.-based Trezevant Realty and Olive Branch, Miss.-based Utley Properties, the shopping center will include 61,000 square feet of specialty stores anchored by a 58,300-square-foot Belk department store, freestanding restaurants, and an 80-room hotel. The value of the project exceeds $30 million. Across the street from the new development is a Wal-Mart Supercenter-anchored center, built by Trezevant in 2003.

Island ‘paradise’ awaits

Miami Beach, Fla.-based Flagstone Property Group is planning a luxury development to be called Island Gardens on Watson Island near Miami. The mixed-use development will include a yacht harbor, luxury hotels, retail, dining and luxury residences. Retail and dining will account for 221,000 square feet of space, with more than 60 retail outlets. A promenade will stretch along a 1,000-foot length of sea wall, and 6.5 acres will be devoted to public space with a fish market and a maritime art gallery. The project is located between downtown Miami and South Beach and will feature the only super-yacht harbor in North America. The area is also a gateway for Miami and the Caribbean, as well as the airport and the Carnival Center for Performing Arts. The $575 million project will break ground in the fall, and retail shops will open in mid-2009.

Villages gets bigger

The Villages is getting larger. Currently the largest single-site residential development in the U.S., The Villages, Fla., is a 25,000-acre community spanning three counties. The developers announced plans to build a third town center to be called Brownwood. Plans include 350,000 square feet of retail, restaurants and entertainment venues. The center will be located in between Wildwood, Fla., and Leesburg, Fla. When the third center is complete, there will be over 1 million square feet of town center space in the area. The center will be developed by The Villages, which is family owned. A construction date has not been set.

Centerra grows

Loveland, Colo.-based development firm McWhinney Enterprises announced plans for the Grand Station at Centerra, the latest addition to the Centerra master-planned community in Loveland, Colo. The 1 million-square-foot, 60-acre, mixed-use development will include 480,000 square feet of shopping and dining, 145,000 square feet of office space, 100,000 square feet of medical space, 160 residences and a 400-room hotel. Grand Station will include a streetcar station, underground parking and a clock tower plaza. The project is scheduled to open in fall 2009.

Dutch mix uses

The Netherland’s Foruminvest will enter a joint venture with housing association De Kleine Meierij and the municipality of ’s-Hertogenbosch to develop a mixed-use complex in Rosmalen, the Netherlands. Plans include 129,100 square feet (12,000 square meters) of shops and 150 houses. The group has hired Soeters Van Eldonk Architects to design it. Construction for the project is slated to begin in the third quarter of 2008.

Abu Dhabi aims high

Abu Dhabi’s Mazrui Holding Company has teamed up with the Abu Dhabi Tourism Development and Investment Company to build a beach resort, convention center and office-residential complex, to be called the Lagoon Club Hotel and Residences. The project is projected to cost

$374 million. The Lagoon Club will have 37,670 Square feet (3,500 square meters) of retail, a 380-room hotel, office space and a convention center that can hold 2,000 people, all situated around a central lagoon. The 10,000-square-meter lagoon will be surrounded by a boardwalk with cafes and restaurants. Construction on the project is set to begin immediately and will be completed in September 2009. The builders say they hope to attract 3 million tourists a year to the destination by 2015 and assert that half these visitors will come from the meetings and business tourism segment.

© 2008 ICSC. All rights reserved. | Terms and Conditions | Privacy Policy | Contact ICSC | ICSC Home |