Trammell, USAA Start $100M MXD

TCC subsidiary, High Street Residential, joined forces with San Antonio-based USAA Real Estate Co. to launch the project's first phase, which will contain 316 apartment units and the entire retail and commercial component. The project at Lamar and Airport Boulevards should be completed in February 2009, months after the adjacent Cap Metro commuter rail station opens.

Lance Sallis, managing director of TCC's Austin office tells GlobeSt.com that the entire buildout will take between three and five years. The timing doesn't count the three years prior to ground breaking, during which Trammell Crow and partner Stratus Real Estate Inc. of Austin, TX acquired the land, cleaned it up, and received input from the community as to the best land use.

The acreage was once a brownfield site. "This had been an industrial site since the 1950s, and the original owner-occupant was Texaco," Sallis says. "Following that, they sold it to Huntsman, which also operated there for years." Before clean-up could commence, however, the city of Austin wanted input from residents and the community as to what a transit-oriented development should offer.

"We're glad to get rolling on this one, Sallis says, adding that Trammell's intent is to hang onto the development once build-out is complete. "This is what Austin wants long term, but we're glad this is the first one."

Lincoln Property Co. of Dallas will handle leasing and management on the residential side, while CB Richard Ellis' Austin office has the leasing and management assignment for the commercial component. Casco Corp.'s southwest office is the general contractor for the commercial side, and Texas BBL LP in Irving, TX, is the contractor for the multifamily component. Dallas-based JHP Architects designed the project.