Lovett Industrial, Clarion Launch 3.1 MSF Project

Interchange 249 Groundbreaking ceremony. Image courtesy of Lovett Industrial

A joint venture between Lovett Industrial and Clarion Partners has broken ground on the initial phase of the 240-acre Interchange 249 industrial business park in Tomball, Texas. At full buildout, the three-phase master-planned development will encompass more than 3.1 million square feet of industrial space across 10 buildings, as well as a 90,000-square-foot retail component, according to the site plan.

Clarion Partners provided a two-year $60 million mortgage for the development, Harris County records show.

The owners have selected Cushman & Wakefield to market the industrial park. The leasing team includes Executive Managing Director Jim Foreman and Senior Director Allison Bergmann.

The first phase

The developers expect to wrap construction on the 1.9 million-square-foot initial phase by the first quarter of 2023. Macy’s Inc. is the component’s first tenant as well as its anchor, having signed a prelease for the largest facility within the first phase of the new development.

The joint venture has selected Powers Brown Architecture as the lead architect and Kimley-Horn as civil engineer. The development team also includes Harvey Builders as the general contractor for the Macy’s facility.

Plans for the first phase call for a 908,853-square-foot build-to-suit facility with cross-dock design, another cross-dock building totaling 746,246 square feet, a 138,375-square-foot front load structure and a rear-load facility totaling 98,400 square feet. The four facilities will offer clear heights between 32 and 40 feet, along with 577 trailer parking spaces, and ESFR sprinklers systems.

Interchange 249 will take shape along the Grand Parkway, with a roughly one mile frontage and near Highway 249. Downtown Houston is some 32 miles southeast of the industrial park, while George Bush Intercontinental Airport is 25 miles away.

Houston’s industrial sector

As of January, the Houston metro had nearly 16.3 million square feet of new industrial projects underway, representing 3.0 percent of the overall stock, CommercialEdge data shows. In the same period, the market also registered a 2.2 percent rent growth over the last 12 months, with average rents reaching $5.86 per square foot, slightly below the national average of $6.46.

While Interchange 249 is Lovett Industrial’s seventh industrial project in the Houston metro, the locally based developer is also active in five other markets. In December, the real estate investment firm started construction on Trinity West Business Park, a 1.9 million square feet industrial park in Dallas. The first phase is set to be delivered this summer.

In January, Lovett Industrial announced plans for a two-building industrial campus encompassing 1.7 million square feet in Glendale, Ariz. NorthPark Logistics Center will stretch across 139 acres.