The developers of a $135-million shopping center near the famed Huntington Beach Pier face an unusual challenge how to embrace the city's proud identity as Surf City without descending into surfing kitsch.

Sure, they hope to attract tourists in town to take in the beach scene, but the builders also want Orange County locals to feel comfortable at the Pacific City shopping and dining complex under construction on Pacific Coast Highway.

Signs made of surfboards, woodies parked by the valet stand and large surfing movie posters in the parking garage were considered and rejected, said Linda Berman, executive project director for developer DJM Capital Partners.

Figuring out how to communicate to visitors that they are in the "Surfing Capital of the World" without relying on cliched props has proved daunting.

"Surf culture is more attitudinal than it is aesthetic," she said. "You run out of imagery pretty quickly."

So the developers are trying to give Pacific City a laid-back beach house vibe by using natural materials such as wood and stone, accented with drought-resistant plants.

Locals will judge for themselves whether DJM hit the right notes when 11-acre Pacific City opens in summer 2015.

Work on the mall's two-level parking garage is well underway, and construction of the retail portion is scheduled to begin shortly.

The design aesthetic for Pacific City envisioned by architects Jerde Partnership and SMS Architects is a modern, craftsman-influenced beach bungalow. Restaurants there will have outdoor patio dining with ocean views.

Movies some of them surf related will be shown on an outdoor screen. The design will include what DJM calls "hang out" spaces intended to encourage people to stroll and congregate.

Continue reading here:
Huntington Beach's Pacific City complex aims to draw locals, tourists

Orlando, FL (PRWEB) June 24, 2014

Orlando construction dumpster rental company Sunshine Recycling is currently working with Clermont-based contractor Schmid Construction on the development of a Dicks Sporting Goods retail store. Sunshine is providing portable toilets, dumpsters and regular hauling. The new development includes the retail store and a smaller restaurant space and is located on a parcel of land facing State Road 50 near Fashion Square Mall in Orlando. The buildings will replace outdated and decades-old shopping sites.

Sunshine Recycling currently has one construction dumpster on location and is providing multiple hauls to collect construction debris. The 50,010-square-foot standalone retail store was developed by Tennessee-based UP Development Inc. The building and a smaller restaurant space are replacing a former Toys R Us and smaller retail spaces that were demolished last year.

This is the second Dicks Sporting Goods location approved and constructed in central Florida this year. A standalone location in the Sandhill Commons shopping area in Clermont, FL will celebrate its grand opening Friday, June 27 through Sunday, June 29, 2014.

This new development will bring temporary jobs to the area as the site is prepped for construction and the new developments are built, but this construction will also add more long-term employment opportunities in Orlando, said Chuck Herb, owner of Sunshine Recycling. We appreciate the opportunity to participate in the growth and development of our city and the local economy.

About Sunshine Recycling Inc.: Sunshine Recycling Inc. of Orlando is a dumpster rental company servicing central Florida. Offering various sizes of dumpsters including front-load, roll-off and full-size construction dumpsters, Sunshine Recycling also provides recyclable, waste and construction debris collection and hauling services and trash compactors. The company is a proud member of the U.S. Green Building Council and is LEED AP certified. For more information about construction dumpsters from Sunshine Recycling, please visit http://www.orlando-dumpsters.com/construction-dumpsters/.

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Orlando Roll Off Dumpsters Provider Currently Assisting on Construction of New Dicks Sporting Goods Retail Store

Groundbreaking for housing, retail and commercial space in oil boom town

Local and state officials gave a helping hand recently on a groundbreaking for the Bakken Village building in Watford City, marking the beginning of 2014 spring construction on a 90-acre housing, retail and commercial development at the heart of the oil boom.

Bakken Development Solutions representatives, along with North Dakota Lieutenant Governor Drew Wrigley, Watford City Mayor Brent Sanford and others, threw dirt and spoke at the Thank You Watford City event, presented by The Crossings at Watford City.

Projects like The Crossings at Watford City enhance the quality of life in our communities, said Wrigley. Watford City has grown more robustly in the last few years than anyone could have imagined. It will be exciting to see this development completed and providing housing, diverse retail and business options for one of North Dakotas most dynamic communities.

At Bakken Development Solutions, we hope that the community is as pleased as we are with the progress at The Crossings at Watford City, said Paul Dries, COO with Bakken Development Solutions. With local input and assistance, we believe that we are developing a project that will not only benefit the Watford City area, but will serve as an example of responsible development throughout the Bakken.

The Bakken Village is a three-story, 46,000 square-foot building at the center of The Crossings at Watford City that will offer live/work, retail and office architecture with 32 townhome-style apartments on the upper floors and space for office and restaurant locations on the main floor.

Along with the Bakken Village, a regional headquarters for ConocoPhillips, a hotel, townhome-style apartments and other buildings are set to be added to The Crossings.

at Watford City development. The citys new southeast bypass is also being constructed in the middle of this expansion.

The Crossings at Watford City is a 90-acre development located two miles east of the Watford City Municipal Airport.

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90-acre development in Watford City opens

The latest hearing at the Paramus Zoning Board of Adjustment on the construction of a Panera Bread and retail space at 770 Route 17 north was briefly interrupted following a heated exchanged between the applicant and objectors.

The outburst occurred while the objector's attorney was questioning the applicant's witnesses, and prompted objector Richard Cacciatore to leave the room. In response, zoning board vice chairman Gerald Rickelmann called for a short recess. He said that neither side of the debate wanted such a tense situation during proceedings.

"What happened here tonight cannot and will not happen again. I am going to give a warning on the record to the applicant, because I felt people were uncomfortable in here," Rickelmann said. "I don't think anybody should have to tolerate feeling that uncomfortable when there's tempers flaring."

The application's objectors consist of a group of residents who live near the property where the restaurant and retail are proposed, and are concerned that the restaurant could affect their quality of life. Members of the group have hired their own attorney to present their case before the board.

The current plan is related to the Equinox Health Club property next door, which was also opposed by neighbors but approved by the Planning Board in 2011. The new application shares a parking lot with the existing structure, creating a total of 453 parking spaces while 598 are required.

The site of the current application is home to an abandoned structure that will be demolished and replaced with a 15,000-square-foot undetermined retail space and a 4,500-square-foot restaurant with drive-through that will be used to house a Panera Bread.

At the end of the previous hearing, the board suggested traffic engineer Hal Simoff gather more data for determining traffic at the restaurant. During previous testimony he stated that he had not performed a full traffic study in Paramus, and was using observations from a similar-sized franchise in Edison.

Simoff presented a new report on the capability of the restaurant's drive-through to stack cars. He returned to the Edison restaurant, which also has a drive-through and is located next to a major highway, and conducted a traffic count from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., peak lunch hours.

The Edison location can queue nine cars at once, the same intensity planned for the Paramus facility, according to Simoff. Each half-hour segment saw 13 to 19 cars enter the queue, with an average time spent of eight minutes. The peak hour for the drive-through consisted of 34 cars, which was the approximate number put forth by the applicant when they designed the size of the queue.

"The actual studies indicate that with a peak hour count of 34 vehicles, the queue never exceeded eight vehicles," Simoff said. "Therefore, I would suggest the numbers are comparable to the Paramus Panera Bread site."

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Paramus zoning board meeting gets heated

County and state officials on Monday broke ground on the first step of a $180 million mixed-use project that will bring housing, office and retail space to a plot of land next to the Savage MARC station in Howard County.

The Annapolis Junction project will combine 416 apartments, 100,000 square feet of office space, 17,000 square feet of retail space and a 150-room hotel on the nearly 19-acre site, located close to the National Security Agency's headquarters at Fort Meade.

The groundbreaking June 9 was for a 704-space parking garage for the development, which is a joint effort by the Howard County government, the Maryland Department of Transportation and private developers Somerset Construction Company and OA Partners.

The garage will incorporate space for buses bringing employees from Baltimore's Pennsylvania Station and Washington's Union Station to Fort Meade. Officials said 57,000 cars currently pass through Fort Meade every day.

We have formed a partnership to support the mission of Fort Meade, help workers get on and off the base, and bring much-needed economic growth to an important part of the county, Howard County Executive Ken Ulman said of the project in a statement.

The development is scheduled to be finished by spring 2016 and is expected to create 712 new permanent jobs, as well as several hundred temporary construction jobs, officials said.

Read more from the original source:
Crews break ground on Annapolis Junction project

Property developer Megaworld Corp. expects to develop more than five million square meters of residential, office, property and retail space over the next 10 years, replicating its scale of production during the last 25 years.

On its silver anniversary this 2014, Megaworld expects to grow its net income and revenues by a double-digit level, said company executive director Kingson Sian.

If the company were to grow by at least 10 percent this year, this suggests that Megaworld may end the year with a net profit breaching the P10-billion mark. Net profit in 2013 amounted to P9.04 billion, which included P763 million in non-recurring income from the acquisition of a subsidiary with a landbank whose values have increased even prior to development.

Reservation sales this year are seen breaching P70 billion from last years P68 billion.

Since the companys inception, Sian said the company had completed five million square meters of residential, office and retail space in various township projects. About the same amount of projects had been either launched or already under construction to date. What weve done in the last 25 years, well do in the next 10 years, Sian told stockholders.

In line with this, Sian said the company was on track to build up rental assets that would generate an annual recurring income of at least P10 billion by 2017 or 2018. This year, rental income was seen reaching P7 billion compared to about P6 billion last year, he said.

We pretty much add close to a billion (pesos) a year in rental income, Sian said, noting this would come from the development of new assets as well as in the escalation of leasing rates in the existing portfolio.

Megaworld has likewise ruled out tapping the equity market to cover the recently announced P230-billion capital spending for the next five years.

We have already mapped it out in terms of financial plan. Bulk of that P230 billion will go to residential, which is pre-sold so its self-funding. The remaining 35 percent will be funded by the rental revenue that were collecting and the P30 billion cash that were keeping in our balance sheet and potentially some debt. But definitely, (theres) no equity fund-raising, Sian said.

In a report to stockholders, Megaworld chair Andrew Tan said long-term value creation was at the core of his companys business. It is through this strategy that we have differentiated our real estate offerings from the competition and carved out a path toward the companys longevity and sustainability, he told stockholders.

Original post:
Megaworld sees net profit breaching P10B mark

Poole, Dorset (PRWEB UK) 19 June 2014

Nowadays, with online retailing becoming more popular than ever and costs of renting a shop space continuing to soar, business landlords are now under more pressure than ever to persuade retailers to sign new leases.

Introduced by cities across the world such as Tokyo, London, Los Angeles and New York City, the concept of a pop up store allows the retailer to use a temporary space to market their products, gaining recognition and generating a buzz for the company wherever they go.

Another reason that swayed retailers to go with this new solution is the insignificant difference in cost: launching pop-up store costs 80% less than renting out a traditional retail store.

Big brands such as Ebay, Adidas, Kate Spade and Lacoste are just some of the big names that have followed the pop-up shop trend and have taken their creativity one step further.

A great example of a system that can be used by retailers to set up their very own pop-up store is The Prestige System, which is a modular and portable solution that allows clients to re-configure their stand for different retail spaces.

The system is also ideal for all exhibitions, conferences and live marketing events.

Quadrant2Design, the sole UK suppliers of Prestige based in Poole in Dorset, have adapted the system into the World's first bespoke Pop-up Shop System.

The Swiss-designed Prestige Events System is constructed from lightweight, but extremely strong, aluminium pop-up frames which are ideal for easy transportation, as pop-up shops travel around frequently. This structure bestows on Prestige the twin benefits of easy and rapid construction, without any tools or special knowledge.

Graphics magnetise to the erected framework in seconds, rapidly forming stunning, and seamless-effect graphic walling, with the option of integrated, brightly lit product showcases and floating-effect digital screens.

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Introducing the new phenomenon: The Prestige System Pop-up shop

Design Collective Inc.

New renderings of the Blairs development in Silver Spring. The redevelopment consists of about 450,000 square feet for retail and commercial space and 3.4 million square feet for residential living.

First new building expected in 2017

by Aline Barros

Staff Writer

The Blairs Urban Redevelopment in Silver Spring will begin a 20-year transformation late this summer with the demolition of four mid-rise buildings constructed in 1959.

The redevelopment consists of about 450,000 square feet for retail and commercial space and 3.4 million square feet for residential living.

Twenty percent of the area for the project bounded by Colesville Road, East-West Highway, Blair Mill Road and Eastern Avenue is set aside for public space and urban parks.

On June 10, The Tower Companies and the Abramson family presented new renderings and talked about the future of the Blairs community.

We certainly have our own community on our own grounds, but at the same time, we are going to have an open green space, we are going to have dog parks and we will allow the community [non-Blairs residents] to come in and hopefully have community events, said Gary Abramson, a partner at The Tower Companies and son of the original developer, Albert Sonny Abramson.

Link:
$650 million Blairs project heading to first phase of redevelopment -- Gazette.Net

Hot Properties highlights recently sold or leased commercial properties in the Charleston region. Submissions should be sent to dailyjournal@scbiznews.com.

Chad Yonce of Southeastern Management Group represented the tenant, E Cig South, in the lease of 1,027 square feet of retail space at Crowfield Plaza in Ladson from Crowfield Investors. Brandon Underwood of Victory Real Estate Investments represented the landlord.

Ryan Welch of Lee & Associates Charleston represented the buyer, Construction Equipment Solutions LLC, in the sale of a 13,057-square-foot industrial building at 2720 Midland Park Road in North Charleston from First Citizens Bank & Trust Co. Inc. for $280,000. Todd Garrett with Avison Young represented the seller.

Jeremy Willits and Gerry Schauer of Avison Young represented the landlord, First Point Properties LLC, in the lease extension of a 5,114-square-foot office space at 498 Wando Park Blvd. in Mount Pleasant to Weekley Homes L.P.

Thomas G. Buist Jr. of Lee & Associates Charleston represented the landlord, M&C of Charleston LLC, in the lease of a 10,000-square-foot industrial space at 7289 Spa Road in North Charleston to BeavEx Inc. Luke Denny with Fischer & Co. represented the tenant.

Chad Yonce of Southeastern Management Group represented the tenant, Surface Craft Gallery, in the lease of retail space at 49 John St. in Charleston from Patterson Smith Co. The landlord was represented by Patterson Smith.

Edward Robinson with The Beach Co. Beach Commercial represented the tenant, Joan Crosby Ladies Retail, in the lease of 1,500 square feet of retail space at 208 King St., Suite A, in Charleston from Fulton Lane Inn.

Carl Michael Harrison with The Beach Co. Beach Commercial represented the landlord, The Beach Co., in the lease of 3,730 square feet of office space in The Shoppes at Seaside Farms, 1952 Long Grove Drive, Suites 201 and 203, in Mount Pleasant to CMA Properties LLC. David Grubbs Jr. with NAI Avant Charleston LLC represented the tenant.

Gregg Legerton of Avison Young represented the landlord, Tobias LLC, in the lease extension of office space at 1483 Tobias Gadson Blvd. in Charleston to Roper St. Francis Physicians Network.

Vitre Stephens and Todd Garrett of Avison Young represented the landlord, Stanley Miles Properties LLC, in the lease of 1.1 acres of land at 2646 South Live Oak Drive in Moncks Corner to Hawkeye Buildings LLC, dba Premier Portable Buildings.

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Hot Properties for June 16, 2014

Former Springs Health Club demolished to make way for furniture store

3:14pm Tuesday 10th June 2014 in News

A DERELICT former health club has been demolished at Teesside Retail Park to make way for a 4.5m furniture store.

Springs Health Club, which has stood empty and decaying at the entrance to the Stockton shopping park since 2007, has been flattened to make way for a new Barker and Stonehouse store which will also house its head office.

The huge store, the size of a football pitch, will include an in-store cafe, two floors of retail space and a car park for almost 100 cars.

Site manager Dennis McLuckie, of contractors McLuckie Projects, said: "Its great to be on-site and able to get started with the project. Were hoping to begin the construction phase in early July and to be weather-tight by Christmas.

The store is planned to open for early 2015. Barker and Stonehouse was founded in Stockton in 1946 and following expansion it is now a national retailer, with showcase stores in London and across the country.

James Barker, managing director of Barker and Stonehouse, said: This is going to be a spectacular store and will be a great asset to the Teesside Retail Park and wider Teesside area.

"Building work is expected to create work for about 60 to 70 local tradesmen and the shop is expected to employ around 40 full-time staff.

"News that the Springs site will finally be regenerated and replaced with a new Barker and Stonehouse store is really welcome."

Link:
Former Springs Health Club demolished to make way for furniture store