Trammel Crow, Clarion Betting Big on I-85 Industrial

ATLANTA—There's something new brewing in Northeast Atlanta. Trammell Crow Company (TCC) and joint venture partner Clarion Partners just acquired a 122-acre site located on Interstate 85 in the Jackson County segment of the Northeast industrial submarket. That's the largest industrial submarket in metro Atlanta.

TCC and Clarion plan to build a two-phase, class A industrial development on the site called Jefferson Mill Business Park. The park will be home to three industrial buildings totaling nearly 1.8 million square feet.

“The robust I-85 interstate connects Atlanta to the United States East Coast distribution corridor, specifically the Piedmont Atlantic Megaregion, spanning Birmingham to Raleigh, which contains 12% of the US population and is one the fastest growing areas in the country,” says Mark Dishaw, senior vice president with TCC's Atlanta Business Unit. “Due to its location, this area has proven to be one of the best logistical locations for distributors in the Southeastern US and is home to many major corporations such as Haverty's Furniture, Toyota, Kubota, and Walgreens.”

Phase I will feature an 822,257-square-foot bulk cross-dock warehouse and a 250,569-square-foot rear load distribution center. Construction will start by the end of 2015 and be completed in 2016. Phase II of the Park will be a 720,836-square-foot speculative or build-to-suit bulk cross-dock warehouse, developed for maximum flexibility to meet the demands of the ultimate end user.

The site offers access to Interstate 85, the US 129 Interchange, US 129 via Concord Parkway, and Hog Mountain Road/McClure Industrial Road. The Colliers International team of Ben Logue and Price Weaver brokered the land sale and will also handle the leasing and marketing of the site on behalf of TCC and Clarion Partners.

There's a massive amount of industrial commercial real estate coming online in Atlanta. Much of it is speculative building. Is it too much? Time will tell, but for now developers keep building. Atlanta has certainly hit industrial boom status.

“Development and construction are absolutely booming,” Sim Doughtie, president of King Industrial Realty/CORFAC International, in Atlanta, tells GlobeSt.com. “With over 7 million square feet of new construction recorded during the second quarter, we also set a record for new construction in a single quarter.”