"We scoured the market," says Marti E. Nemer, senior vice president for Jones Lang LaSalle in Dallas. The search stretched along North Central Expressway and the Dallas North Tollway before it was narrowed it to the Midway Road vicinity. The Harrisburg, PA-based TransCore, a subsidiary of Roper Industries Inc. of Duluth, GA, will move from a full floor of class A office space in Tollway Crossing at 19111 N. Dallas Pkwy. to class B office tech space in two of five buildings in Midway Commons along Midcourt Road. She tells GlobeSt.com that the relocation will coincide with a lease expiration.

Nemer and JLL colleague Michael Hart in the Washington, DC office had pruned options to a handful of buildings in North Dallas. "It just worked from an employee standpoint," she explains. "It became clear to us and TransCore that this location offered a terrific opportunity for productivity enhancement coupled with a compelling business proposition."

Susan Singer, senior vice president and managing partner of Dallas-based Bradford Cos., says construction is about to ramp up on 13,783 sf in the project's largest building, 78,502 sf at 3410 Midcourt Rd. and 13,448 sf of a 24,115-sf structure at 3414 Midcourt Rd. The deal pushes the five-building complex, totaling 209,152 sf, to 72% occupancy and 46,000 sf in new deals since the year started, according to Singer.

TransCore will be the largest tenant in the complex, getting its name on the sign as part of the deal. Falcon Southwest, led by Phil Capron of Austin, bought Midway Commons in October 2005. "He bought it knowing it would be substantially vacant," Singer says, adding a significant amount of work has been done, including spec suites, for the asset's turnaround play. The post-renovation quote is $8 per sf net.