SAVANNAH, GA-The 2,200-acre Savannah River International Trade Park is emerging as the largest magnet in the Southeast for the development of mega-sized warehouses, area industrial brokers and researchers tell GlobeSt.com. About 12 million sf of new warehouse product has been built at and near the Port of Savannah over the past year.

Sources in a position to know tell GlobeSt.com the newest planned project is an estimated $50-million, one-million-sf import warehouse that Sweden-based IKEA would use to house its furniture products. IKEA representatives couldn't be reached by GlobeSt.com's publication deadline to confirm its development plans.

However, area brokers familiar with the Georgia Ports Authority's property tell GlobeSt.com the IKEA warehouse would be built near Minneapolis-based Target Corp.'s planned two-million-sf, $100 million, 200-acre warehouse on a site known locally as Mulberry Grove, as GlobeSt.com previously reported. The site is a former rice plantation where Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin, according to area historians.

Home Depot and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. each have existing 500,000-sf warehouses near the port which has direct access to rail lines and Interstate 95. Savannah is 200 miles southeast of Downtown Atlanta. The trade park is about four miles from Savannah's main port terminal.

Area industrial brokers following the port's development progress tell GlobeSt.com IKEA has no existing warehouse space in Georgia or Florida but has two-million-sf distribution warehouses in Southern California and Maryland and plans to expand a 700,000-sf warehouse in New Jersey. IKEA opened a 366,000-sf, $50-million retail store at the Atlantic Station redevelopment in Midtown in July.