Cousins Plans Eighth Avenue-Brand Retail Venture

ALPHARETTA, GA-Cousins Properties Inc., metro Atlanta's most aggressive developer, has filed preliminary plans to create its eighth national Avenue-brand retail development in this corporate-oriented suburb, 30 miles north of Downtown Atlanta.

Cousins officials tell GlobeSt.com they have applied for a rezoning of the 12 acres they have owned for 30 years on the northwest corner of North Point Drive and Haynes Bridge Road. The land currently has an office-only zoning status. The unnamed 170,000-sf project would include 145,000 sf of retail and 25,000 sf of office in two stories above the main retail structure. A parking deck would also be part of the project.

Cousins officials say it is too early to formally announce project details, but area brokers and consultants familiar with Cousins' previous Avenue-brand projects tell GlobeSt.com the Alpharetta venture will probably come in at about $15 million. The development site is off the Haynes Bridge Road exit at GA 400, near the 1.5-million-sf North Point Mall.

The Alpharetta planning commission is scheduled to review the project March 3. The city council will vote on the plans March 28. The Alpharetta Avenue project is near a second Cousins undertaking on the west side of GA 400. The developer plans a 219-acre project with an undetermined amount of office, retail and housing built around the Encore Park for the Arts, a 27-acre arts campus.

Cousins' Avenue projects to date include four properties in metro Atlanta--the 356,000-sf, estimated $34-million Avenue Web Gin Corners; the Avenue East Cobb, 226,000 sf, estimated $18 million; the Avenue Peachtree, 182,000-sf, estimated $14.6 million; and the Avenue West Cobb, 205,000 sf, estimated $16.4 million.

Outside of Georgia, Cousins has the Avenue Viera, Viera, FL, 415,000 sf, estimated $50 million; the Avenue of the Peninsula in Rolling Hills Estates, Los Angeles, 374,000 sf, estimated $30 million; and the Avenue Carriage Crossing in the Memphis suburb of Collierville, TN, 800,000 sf, estimated $63 million. Cousins is co-developing Avenue Carriage Crossing with Jim Wilson & Associates of Montgomery, AL.