St. John Brings Focus to Retail at the GATE

ABERDEEN, MD-St. John Properties, the developer for the Government and Technology Enterprise project within Aberdeen Proving Ground, is turning its attention to a little-noticed retail component of the project now that the office piece is well in hand. It is understandable why retail was seemingly bypassed in favor of office--the need for office was urgent when St. John took over from Opus in June 2009.

Over the past 18 months, however, the company has delivered nine office and research and development buildings totaling more than 526,000 square feet within the 416-acre business enclave. In the third quarter the company expects to deliver the Command, Control, Computer, Communication, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C4ISR) command operations. GATE office tenants now include CACI International, L-3 Communications, Raytheon and Science Applications International Corp. The GATE is the only commercial real estate development located on-site at Aberdeen Proving Ground.

Now the firm is in talks with tenants for the retail piece, spokesman Al Cunniff tells GlobeSt.com. The complementary retail component--Commerce Center at Main Gate--compromises two multi-tenant retail buildings consisting of approximately 21,000 and 10,000 square feet of space, respectively. The 10,000-square-foot building is designed to accommodate a childcare facility and two pad sites, which can support such uses as a full-service bank. Another five restaurant pad sites range in size from approximately 2,900 to 7,500 square feet. Demand will be high for all of these uses, Cunniff predicts. “The area is clearly under-retailed, even if you simply consider the thousands of people who already work here.”