Multi-Story Warehouse Breaks Ground in Brooklyn

640 Columbia St. Rendering courtesy of Ware Malcomb

DH Property Holdings has broken ground on a three-story, 370,000-square-foot project in Brooklyn, N.Y., which is poised to become the first multi-level e-commerce distribution facility on the East Coast. Ware Malcomb is the designer of the upcoming building at 640 Columbia St., with Suffolk Construction as general contractor.

The 4.5-acre site is part of the Red Hook district in northwestern Brooklyn, with proximity to interstates 278 and 478. The project has easy access to the rest of the borough as well as Manhattan and Queens, while JFK Airport is less than 20 miles east. Approximately 13.5 million consumers live within an hour’s drive of the site.

The project comprises three stories of warehouse space, with an additional mezzanine parking level that encompasses 184 spaces for employees. The first floor offers some 112,000 square feet, with direct truck access, while a ramp provides entry to the second-floor loading docks. The first and second stories each include 14 dock doors, truck courts and 28-foot clear heights. The third floor has 18-foot ceiling heights and a freight elevator.

Ware Malcomb created 640 Columbia based on its multi-story distribution prototype developed in 2017. Since then, the firm has designed roughly 20 million square feet of such facilities across the country. Cameron Trefry, principal at the company, identified multi-story warehouses as part of a new evolution of industrial design and development in a recent interview with Commercial Property Executive.