Construction Pace Picks Up for $500M Plan

DALLAS-Marking its largest contract in its 20-year history, Cadence McShane Corp. is finalizing subcontractors' pacts to build an entire block of residential units in the $500-million Park Lane development. After 18 months of working with the developer, the Dallas-based Cadence will start to take the project vertical in the coming weeks.

The builder will construct 325 apartments in three buildings, with 20, 15 and four stories. The concrete structures will have 45,000 sf of street retail space. The tower's retail and 590,000 sf of apartment space will be separated by four floors of parking, totaling 505 spaces, and a plaza level with two swimming pools.

Houston-based PM Realty Group teamed with Capri Capital Partners LLC of Chicago to become residential developer for the highly publicized $500-million plan by Harvest Partners of Dallas. The 33-acre redevelopment, which required a building implosion, calls for three million sf of mixed-use space.

Neal L. Harper, president of Cadence McShane, tells GlobeSt.com that prices for items like concrete and elevators were locked in last summer. "There were some contracts we knew we needed commitments on and ones we knew were going to escalate in 2007," he says.

The Turner Building Cost Index, an industry barometer, showed a 2.12% increase in fourth-quarter 2006 construction costs from the third quarter and a 9.65% spike in the past year. "In spite of stabilizing commodity prices and the downturn in the residential market, commercial construction costs continue to rise," Turner vice president Karl F. Almstead says in a release issued yesterday about the findings. He adds that construction volume and limited skilled labor pool "remain a major influence on the increased pricing from specialty contractors."

Harper says at least 250 workers will be on the Block B construction site. Michael Geach, a Cadence McShane vice president, is overseeing construction of a U-shaped design facing NorthPark Mall, the Culinary School of Arts and North Central Expressway. Gromatzky Dupree & Associates of Dallas is the project architect, which incorporated apartments from 600 sf to more than 3,500 sf into the design. Local firm United Commercial Realty/ChainLinks is handling retail leasing.

Cadence is working with a two-year construction schedule. The first units will deliver in summer 2008; full completion is penciled for the following December. "The tower cranes will be arriving in two to three weeks on the site. That's when we'll start going vertical," Harper says. "We currently are signing up all the subcontractors for the various trades."

Last year, Cadence McShane logged "north of $200 million" in projects. "Block B will be the largest single project that we've done in Dallas and our company's history," Harper says.