First out of the ground will be 200,000 sf of upscale retail now being paraded before the brand names that Dallas' Lincoln Property Co. is looking to snag for a 23-acre power center in Terrabrook's Aventerra development in Southlake. The retail tract has been carved from a 280-acre, to-be-built corporate center. Retail construction could start as early as the third quarter, says Rick Croteau, Terrabrook's vice president and general manager for Aventerra.

"This is the ground-breaking of 500-plus acres of new development," Croteau tells GlobeSt.com. Granite Properties of Dallas cornered the office development rights in 2001, but market timing, and rightfully so, delayed plans for a 150,000-sf speculative building. That won't be the case with the retail since Southlake's rooftops primarily belong to the haute couture crowd.

Terrabrook has structured Aventerra's coming out with development partners who buy the land and then game out the product. After 10 years of a land hold, the plan is coming off the backburner so delivery can be practically simultaneous with the completion of Texas 114, designed as a primary feeder between Alliance Airport in northeast Tarrant County and the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.

"At this point," Croteau says, "I feel pretty good about having Lincoln for my retail and Granite for my multi-tenant office." Lincoln wasn't a shoo-in, but won the development right, in part, because its belt was already notched with one successful retail project in Southlake. Croteau confides that Terrabrook talked to 10 retail developers before deciding on Lincoln.

Lincoln's per sf rate for the northeast corner of Texas 114 and White Chapel Road, roughly 25 miles northwest of the Dallas line, isn't being made public, but the power center that it intends to raise is "north of $25 million," Croteau says. If all goes as planned, the center could deliver in spring 2004.

O'Brien & Associates of Dallas is working on the site plan as Lincoln's pre-leasing scouts hit the pavement to court anchors and inline retailers. Croteau says anchors more than likely will hail from the existing DFW line-up. "We need a 20,000-sf to 30,000-sf user to step up to the plate," he says.

Robert Dozier, Lincoln's executive vice president, says talks are under way with several major anchor prospects. Lincoln's land purchase was brokered by Stan McClure of Insignia/ESG.

Meanwhile, Croteau's team is talking to a restaurant developer for an 18-acre tract, west of Lincoln's site, for a cluster development of dining establishments. To the east is a third tract, totaling 180 acres, that's being kept in a land bank for an as-yet undetermined use.