The 222,000-sf Barton Skyway IV is due to deliver in January. Southern Union plans to put its corporate offices into the building, but this 10-year lease represents space that's earmarked for executive offices, GlobeSt.com has been told.

Merriman Associates/Architects of Dallas has designed the $38.1-million Barton Skyway IV, which is being constructed by Austin Commercial Inc. Coleman & Associates of Austin is the landscape architect on the project.

Michael A. Kennedy of Commercial Texas in adjunct with Andrea Peskind of Cushman & Wakefield of Texas Inc. has represented Southern Union in its newest signing. Ralph Bistline of Prentiss Properties has acted on the property owner's behalf.

Vignette is the lead tenant in Dallas-based Prentiss Properties Trust's Barton Skyway Office Park. There is strong speculation in Austin's commercial real estate community that the high-tech company is consider releasing some of its 108,000 sf of signed-for space in Barton Skyway IV. That request hasn't come as yet, an insider at Prentiss tells GlobeSt.com. What is occurring, though, is that brokers are actively marketing 52,000 sf of Vignette's space in Barton Skyway III, which delivers in two weeks.

Should Vignette release its Barton Skyway IV office space, Southern Union, more commonly known as Southern Union Gas, would end up the lead tenant at this point. In all, Southern Union leases some 200,000 sf in the Austin area. It is one of the nation's Top 10 natural gas distributors through five divisions. Southern Union Gas of Texas, founded in Wink, TX in 1929, serves about 523,000 customers in Austin, El Paso, Brownsville, Galveston and Port Arthur.