Berlin, Europes fastest-growing tourist destination, is taking a page from Dubais play book by expanding retail offerings for the hordes of visitors.

The Mall of Berlin, a 270-store complex that opened today in the city center, gives the growing numbers of tourists who visit the German capital a new place to spend their money. Within a year, its set to become the countrys largest shopping center as 30 percent more space is added.

Its not really a mall, but a whole new city quarter, said Andreas Kogge, head of Berlin retail leasing at Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. (JLL) The malls on the edge of the city will certainly suffer.

Berlin is expanding its retail offering after building dozens of hotels to keep pace with the influx of visitors. Like Dubai, the Persian Gulf sheikhdom that has the worlds biggest mall, Berlins growing reputation as a shopping destination is bolstering its economy.

The Mall of Berlin, located on the site of the former Wertheim department store a 5-minute walk from Potsdamer Platz, has about 100,000 square meters (1 million square feet) of shops in low-rise stone and glass townhouses that evoke the areas prewar architecture.

The developer, Harald Huth, plans to expand the mall by another 30,000 square meters next year and the complex will include 270 rental apartments centered around a running track and garden. The homes will be among Berlins most expensive, with rents as high as 25 euros a square meter.

This will be the most successful mall in Germany because we built something special at an extraordinary location, Huth said by phone. Tenants include Guess, Karl Lagerfeld and Lacoste.

Retail sales in the German capital climbed 4.7 percent in June from a year earlier, adjusted for inflation, according to the citys statistics office. That compared with a gain of 0.4 percent in the country as a whole.

Berlins economy expanded the most of all German states last year, after lagging behind the national average for more than a decade after reunification, helped by tourism, as overnight stays climbed 8.2 percent to 27 million. Visitors accounted for about a quarter of all retail spending, according to Berlins Retail Federation.

This is an investment for the future, Mayor Klaus Wowereit said last night at a gala event ahead of todays opening. The other mall operators are eyeing this one with concern. But this isnt about taking anything from anyone but about adding to Berlins growth.

View post:
Berlin Super-Mall Traps Cash From Rising Tourist Trade

Saks Fifth Avenue agreed to anchor the retail portion of lower Manhattans Brookfield Place and its parent company, Canadian retailer Hudsons Bay Co. (HBC), will move its U.S. headquarters into office space at the complex.

Hudsons Bay signed leases totaling 485,000 square feet (45,000 square meters) at the property, landlord Brookfield Property Partners LP (BPY) said today in a statement. The agreements will bring the occupancy level at the 8.5 million-square-foot Brookfield Place to 95 percent, its New York-based owner said.

The deals further Brookfield Propertys twin goals of filling about 3 million square feet left behind last year when leases originated by Merrill Lynch & Co. ran out, and repositioning Brookfield Places retail concourse, where $250 million of improvements have been planned. With work on the adjacent World Trade Centers first phase approaching completion, the leases help show what downtown will look like once the construction fences come down.

The agreements speak to the allure of downtown as both a retail and office destination, Dennis Friedrich, chief executive officer of Brookfields global office division, said in the statement. Its another huge step forward for the area.

A three-level Saks store will occupy 85,000 square feet at Brookfield Place. Its Toronto-based owner will have 233,000 square feet of office space at 225 Liberty St. and 166,000 square feet at 250 Vesey St. Brookfield Places name was changed from the World Financial Center in an effort to play down the complexs historic role as a home to banks and investment firms.

The Saks store at the base of 225 Liberty, to open by mid-2016, will be the second New York store for the chain, joining the longtime location on Fifth Avenue between 49th and 50th streets, near St. Patricks Cathedral, Hudsons Bay said in a separate statement.

The new store will cater to what we believe is an underserved and rapidly growing downtown luxury market, CEO Richard Baker said in the statement. Leasing space in this key center in Manhattan will strengthen our foothold as the ultimate luxury shopping destination,

Hudsons Bay also is planning a 55,000-square-foot Saks Off 5th discount store at 1 Liberty Plaza, another Brookfield building, across Church Street from the World Trade Center. That store is scheduled to open in 2017, the company said.

Earlier this year, Time Inc., publisher of Time, Fortune and Sports Illustrated, signed a lease for 700,000 square feet at Brookfield Place, and Bank of New York Mellon Corp. took 350,000 square feet. Both agreements are for space at 225 Liberty, formerly known as 2 World Financial Center.

Conde Nast Publications Inc. and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the main tenants of 1 World Trade Center and 4 World Trade Center respectively, are expected to move into those new towers before the end of the year, authority officials said earlier this month. A Santiago Calatrava-designed transit hub at the trade center is set to open by the end of 2015.

Visit link:
Saks to Open in Lower Manhattan as Hudsons Bay Relocates

Wall Street Lofts developer Roger Gault announced at Tuesdays Midland City Council meeting that national sandwich shop Which Wich signed the first lease in the new buildings retail space.

Gault described Which Wich as a nationally credited tenant and said that the store would be a great amenity to downtown. Gault said that during the construction of the Lofts, he has had to pass on many potential lessees as he has tried to be very selective in his choice of retailers. He said his first choice for the retail space is food and beverage users.

The Lofts are still estimated to open in mid-November. Gault said that the opening date had been pushed back because Fire Marshal James Howard required that all of the sheet rock and fire detectors be installed before the building could be opened to residents. Howard said a fire in March that destroyed an apartment project under construction in Houston is the reason for the requirements.

The parking garage that is being built adjacent to the apartment complex is also due to open in mid-November. The garage will provide a total of 301 parking spots, with 160 in the top two floors allocated for tenants of the Lofts, and 141 in the bottom two floors for the public.

Gault told the council that he was excited about the project coming to fruition, and that he was in preliminary talks about a second phase of the Lofts. But one issue was made clear during the presentation: Without city support for the parking garage, a project like the Wall Street Lofts would not be possible. The developers told the council that the parking shortage in downtown was a major issue for development.

The Lofts have three more retail spaces left open that it intends to fill. Total retail space on the ground floor of the Lofts totals 10,000 square feet, which is split into four 2,500-square-foot areas.

Gault provided figures for the estimated economic stimulus that will be provided downtown. With 126 total tenants spending at least $75 a week, Gault estimated that over a 30-year period the Lofts will create more than $14.7 million of spending in the downtown area. Project incentives from the Midland Development Corp, the city of Midland and Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone board, according to a previous Reporter-Telegram article, were totaled at $6.2 million.

Read more here:
Sandwich shop is first retail tenant at Wall Street Lofts

Conshohocken Borough Council approved borrowing $10,781,000 from two banks Sept. 17 to pay for the construction of the new Conshohocken Borough Hall, police station and retail space in the former Verizon building at West Fourth Avenue and Fayette Street.

Christopher Gibbons, a principal of Concord Public Finance, described the three 25-year bank loans, which will have fixed rates for seven years and variable rates for the balance of the loans.

Fulton Bank will lend $6,781,100 in tax-exempt funds at 2.86 percent interest for seven years and at a variable rate, from 3.5 percent to a maximum rate of 6 percent, for the remaining 18 years.

Phoenixville Federal Bank & Trust will lend $2,630,700 at 1.99 percent interest for seven years and at a variable rate, from 3.84 percent to a maximum rate of 4.75 percent, for the remaining 18 years.

Phoenixville Federal Bank & Trust will also lend $1,369,300 in taxable funds at 2.75 percent interest for seven years and at a variable rate, from 4.34 percent to a maximum rate of 5.99 percent, for the 18-year balance.

We are planning to use a bank financing to do it as inexpensively as possible, Gibbons said. We went out to 35 banks and got 30 proposals.

The total amount borrowed will be $10,709,600 with borrowing costs of $71,500, Gibbons said.

The annual debt service will start at $312,619 in 2015 and increase to $719,766 per year in the subsequent 24 years of the loans.

But borough officials said the $719,766 in annual debt service would be decreased by eliminating the annual $240,000 that the borough currently pays for its office rental at 1 W. First Ave. The borough also expects to receive about $225,000 per year when all of the 20,000 square feet of rental space is occupied in the new borough office building.

This proposal is a great opportunity, Gibons said. Continued...

See the article here:
Conshohocken Borough Council borrows $10.8M for new borough hall

The former Allegheny County Health Department building in Oakland is coming down and a new retail and apartment development is going up.

City planning commission members unanimously approved plans Tuesday to demolish the health department building and to erect a 550,000-square-foot complex that will include 389 apartments and street-level retail space on Forbes and Fifth avenues.

Ambling University Development Group, the Georgia-based developer hired to undertake the project for property owner MWK Forbes LLC, hopes to begin construction of the 13-story building early next year with completion targeted for the end of 2016. Demolition of the health department building is expected to start next month.

The new building is part of a broader development that will include a 138-room hotel that is to be built on two adjacent lots. Two houses on those lots will be razed, with the commissions consent Tuesday.

Skyvue, as the residential tower will be called, will be built between Craft Avenue and Halket Street in Oakland. The complex will include a 286-space parking garage with another 70 set aside for future development.

Approval came despite concern about whether the amount of parking would be adequate given the 389 apartments to be built. Some also worried about the viability of the retail on Fifth, as it will be squeezed into a very tight section of sidewalk.

Ambling CEO Ryan Holmes said the parking should be enough. He said that in projects in Atlanta and Virginia only about 35 to 60 percent of the parking spaces set aside as part of residential projects were actually leased.

Its a concern everywhere you go. Parkings the No. 1 issue. We address it, obviously. The cities are asking for less and less parking. The neighborhoods are wanting more and more parking because they dont have any parking. Its kind of a double-edged sword, he said.

The development won the backing of the Oakland Planning and Development Corporation. Wanda Wilson, executive director, said it is consistent with the groups neighborhood plan and could have a positive impact on the neighborhoods tight housing market.

But she added that such a large-scale project required careful planning to avoid negative impacts to nearby residents. She urged the developer to try to find ways to discourage apartment dwellers and visitors from parking on nearby residential streets.

View original post here:
Former Allegheny County Health Department building in Oakland to be replaced with apartments

Plans have been in the works for years to redevelop Staten Island's north shore. Now, there are some visible signs of progress at one site, where a residential and retail space is expected to rise. NY1's Amanda Farinacci filed the following report.

At one time it was home to the U.S. Navy, a 36-acre space known as the Staten Island Homeportbut don't call it that anymore.

With plans to open next summer as a retail and residential space, the site has a new vibe and a new name: URL.

"Urban Ready Living. And it's kind of a new paradigm for living in the cities and we're excited to bring it to Staten Island. I think it's going to be new, and fresh, and different," says David Barry of Ironstate Development.

Ironstate Development bought the site back in 2008 with plans to build 900 units of housing and 30,000 square feet of retail space.

The first phase includes some 571 housing units meant to keep 20-somethings on Staten Island by giving them a place to rent that's affordable.

Renting at URL comes with a host of amenities, like an outdoor pool, a community garden and a 4,000 square foot gym and yoga studio.

There's also a cafe in the lobby, called Coffeed.

"We are locally sourced. We have a rooftop farm through the Brooklyn Grange that we use a lot of our produce from. We are very community-based, community-focused, community-centric," says Coffeed's Turtle Raffaele.

That's good news for the entire waterfront, because Raffaele will also serve as the site's social programmer.

Read more:
Staten Island Living, Retail Development Taking Shape on North Shore

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. -

The long awaited La Entrada de Santa Barbara hotel and retail project is expected to become a reality in the next two years, but construction permits are still a few days off.

The city says the developer, known as 35 State Street Partners, are cleared to begin. The group involves Los Angeles businessman and developer Michael Rosenfeld who has been to Santa Barbara to usher the project through after several setbacks over the last 20 years involving other owners.

The project will encompass three of the four corners at State St. and Mason St. This is a block up from the watefront and near the popular "funk zone." There will be 123 rooms, over 20,000 square feet of retail space, along with paseos, and 243 parking spaces. The remaining corner will be a boutique hotel that will be developed by the Romasanta family after a widening project for Mission Creek and a new bridge are completed by the city.

The city says the Entrada project has a completion deadline of June 2016.

One key component is the integration of the Californian Hotel, a 1920's era landmark that has been gutted except for the front facade.

All three aspects of the Entrada project will be completed together.

The last large scale project in Santa Barbara that would come close to this in the downtown or waterfront area was the Paseo Nuevo mall in 1990.

Follow this link:
La Entrada de Santa Barbara Hotel-Retail Project Closer but Permit Still a Few Days Off

Raleigh, N.C. (PRWEB) September 22, 2014

A new upscale, off-campus student housing community is coming to North Carolina State University and will open in Summer 2015. Kane Realty Corporation, a Raleigh-based development and management company focused on mixed-use properties, began construction on the $78 million project this past spring. Stanhope will continue the revitalization of Hillsborough Street with 822 beds and 25,000 square feet of retail space.

Located just steps from NC State University and less than one mile from Meredith College, Stanhope is situated at 3001 Hillsborough Street. Named to honor the historic Stanhope neighborhood, the mixed-use community will offer students a wide range of amenities, including an oasis saltwater pool with splash deck, outdoor courtyards with televisions, fire pits, grills and open green space, integral parking deck, hi-tech cyber lounge, study lounges on each floor, art studio, two-story game room, fitness center with cardio mezzanine and two tanning rooms, ground level retail, restaurants and services and more.

Uniquely, the community is heavily focused on green living, offering electronic car charging stations, recycling rooms on every floor, a bicycle storage room, energy efficient windows, sustainable landscaping design with organic fertilizer and LED lighting used throughout the grounds and more.

We identified an opportunity to create a truly unmatched type of student living that focused on not only amazing amenities and convenience, but also the importance of being environmentally-friendly, said John Kane, CEO of Kane Realty Corporation. We are confident that Stanhope will be a one-of-a-kind living destination for University students.

Residents will be able to choose from a variety of spacious floor plans including studio, one-, two-, three- and four-bedroom options. The individual apartments will come fully furnished and will include televisions with cable and HBO, Energy Star appliances, granite countertops, wood plank style flooring, smart key unit entry system, washer and dryer and more. The entire property is also equipped with high-speed Wi-Fi, and will employ an on-site maintenance and management staff.

Kane Realty Corporation has hired Asset Campus Housing(ACH), the largest management and privately held student housing company in the U.S., to manage the residential community.

We are very excited to partner with Kane Realty Corporation to manage the successful lease-up of Stanhope, said Joe Goodwin, senior vice president of marketing for Asset Campus Housing. We look forward to helping bring this community to life in Raleigh and to foster a fun and interactive environment that promotes success for every resident.

Kane Realty Corporation will lease and manage the retail space. The project team also includes Little Diversified Architectural Consulting and Clancy & Theys General Contractors. Financing is provided by Wells Fargo Bank and Federal Capital Partners.

Stanhope student apartments will open for students Summer 2015. For more information, please visit http://www.livestanhope.com or in-person at the residential leasing office, located at 2408 Hillsborough Street, Raleigh, NC. Retail inquiries can be directed to Kane Realty Corporation, 919.833.7755.

Read this article:
Construction Underway on Kane Realty Corporation's $78 Million Student Housing Community at NC State University

Developers broke ground a few days ago at 16th and N Streets for the new Eviva Midtown apartment building. But in reality, most of the complex will be built miles away in a former aircraft hangar.

The six-story project formerly called The Warren will be constructed piece by piece out of prefabricated housing units assembled by Zeta Communities at McClellan Park in North Highlands. The modular units will be trucked to the building site, where a crane will lift and stack them atop a concrete podium.

The individual units will roll off the assembly line at the Zeta plant complete with bathrooms, kitchens and flooring. They will be bolted together, connected to utilities and covered with a roof and external skin to create five stories of apartments above street-level shops and underground parking.

Theres tremendous time saved because were working on what will go on top of the foundation while (the general contractor is) doing site work and utilities, said Dennis Gleason, project manager at Zeta. By the time they finish the foundation, we have units stored here that are ready to be shipped to the site and put in place.

Its the first time the method has been used in the capital, though several structures in Davis, San Francisco and Silicon Valley have been assembled from Zetas prefab units.

The midtown structure is also a first for Atlanta-based developer The Integral Group, which intends to build more Eviva-brand apartments in San Francisco, Denver and Atlanta. The Sacramento building is a prototype of sleek inner-city apartment buildings that will replace urban eyesores.

The word Eviva is literally the center of the word revival, Chris Martorella, president of Integrals investment management division, told an audience at Thursdays groundbreaking ceremony. He called the projects modular construction the future of efficient building techniques, although he said it wont be used in the other Eviva projects.

When completed in late 2015, Eviva Midtown will feature 118 high-end rental units, a yoga studio and a movie-screening lawn, among other amenities, Martorella said. Plans for the ground floor include more than 5,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space.

Rents will range from $1,600 a month for a one-bedroom apartment to $2,150 for a two-bedroom unit, and premium corner units will rent for more, said Marc de la Vergne, deputy executive director of the Capital Area Development Authority, the city-state agency that initiated the project.

They (Integral) view Sacramento as a great place to launch the Eviva line of apartments, de la Vergne said.

Read more:
Cutting-edge building in midtown Sacramento will use ...

Officials from the city and the National Park Service are nearing an agreement on a land swap in which the city would get the Park Service's parking lot off Dutton Street for further development in the Hamilton Canal District. In exchange, the city would build a parking garage in this area abutting the lot. See a video at lowellsun.com. SUN / DAVID H. BROW

Sun staff photos can be ordered by visiting our SmugMug site.

LOWELL -- After nearly two years of negotiation, officials from the city and the Lowell National Park Service are poised to announce a land-swap proposal that would call for construction of a 950-space garage in the Hamilton Canal District on land directly abutting what is now the Park Service parking lots on Dutton Street.

The garage would include retail space on the ground floor -- much like the Early Garage on Middlesex Street -- as well as high ceilings to accommodate National Park Service buses.

In exchange, the Park Service would turn over the parking-lot space to the city, which in turn would allow for further development in the $800 million Hamilton Canal District. One possibility for such development: a new headquarters for the Lowell Five Cent Savings Bank, which has received an offer for its space at One Merrimack Plaza and is looking to move out by next spring (see related story).

"There's been a lot going on, but a few things have broken loose," said Peter Aucella, assistant superintendent of the Park Service's Lowell operations. "It's an elaborate process."

"Everyone I've talked to has expressed the need for a parking garage," said City Manager Kevin Murphy. "That will pave the way for further development there."

It was nearly two years ago that President Barack Obama signed into law a bill filed by U.S. Rep. Niki Tsongas, D-Lowell, that enabled the National Park Service to exchange land with the city, state or UMass Building Authority.

Aucella said the law requires that the land swap be equal in value. And getting to equality has proven to be tricky, particularly because the city needs to accommodate not only parking for passenger cars but also for up to 11 charter buses.

Adam Baacke, who headed the city's Department of Planning and Development before taking a similar position at UMass Lowell in February, said accommodating the 158 passenger-car spots was easy -- the city would simply reserve that number of spaces in the new garage.

More here:
Canal-district land swap in works