Regions

The American Commerce Center, a $1 billion, mixed-use skyscraper proposed for 1800 Arch St., in Philadelphia’s Center City, moved another step closer to reality this week when the city’s planning commission unanimously approved zoning changes for the 1.5-acre site.“We are excited to have moved past this hurdle and look forward to the next step in front of the Philadelphia City Council on Dec. 3rd at 9:00 am and are very encouraged by the broad support we have received across the city for the American Commerce Center,” Garrett Miller, president of Hill International Real Estate Partners, L.P., said in a statement….

At the edge of Manhattan’s Meat Packing District in Chelsea, Pier 57 abuts an area that has seen a burst of activity over the last decade. Located at the end of West 15th St. and encompassing some 375,000 square feet of waterfront space plus rooftop area, the pier is now the focus for three bids for renovation.The Hudson River Trust, which controls the pier site, started receiving proposals in October, and will now decide between visions from The Durst Organization and C&K Properties; The Related Cos.; and Youngwoo and Associates L.L.C. The Durst and C&K submission proposes a total development…

Bridge Development Partners L.L.C. in partnership with Globe Corp. will develop 555 Corporate Center, a 162,000-square-foot, four-story speculative office building at 555 Aptakisic Road in Lincolnshire, Ill.  Plans call for the Class A office facility to be LEED certified by the U.S. Green Building Council. The facility is situated on a 12-acre site west of Milwaukee Avenue and on the north side of Aptakisic Road, directly north of Bridge’s Aptakisic Creek Corporate Park industrial development in Buffalo Grove.The developer plans to break ground this fall and anticipates a fourth quarter 2009 completion. “When complete, our development will be the only…

Flagler Development Group has signed paper products firm Lagasse Sweet to a 240,000-square-foot lease in a build-to-suit facility at Flagler Station, South Florida’s largest business park.The 10-year lease ranks as the largest in the Miami Dade Airport West submarket this year and brings the firm’s total annual lease transactions for the center to nearly 1 million square feet.                                                A new 328,000-square-foot office/industrial building is currently being constructed in Flagler Station to accommodate the new tenant. The property also offers Class A office, retail and industrial facilities, as well as rail-served buildings, flex space, front-load warehouse space and cross-dock facilities. Jones…

Tennessee-based Gaylord Entertainment has pulled out of a plan to develop a $1 billion resort in Chula Vista, Calif., but the firm claims the project’s abandonment was not caused by the frozen debt markets that have wreaked havoc on developments across the nation. According to Gaylord, the cancellation was not due to financing difficulties, but instead was the result of a “prolonged planning and approval process, a complicated regulatory and legal structure and excessive off-site infrastructure costs.” Gaylord had been in negotiations for the project for the past three years. A 2,000-room hotel and 400,000 square-foot convention center were among…

Using the proceeds to pay down its unsecured line of credit, Boston Properties Inc. has closed on an eight-year, $375 million loan secured by Four Embarcadero Center in San Francisco. The loan was provided by a syndicate of life insurance companies and bears interest at a fixed rate of 6.10 percent annum. The 47-story, Class A office building has approximately 937,000 rentable square feet and is located at the corner of Drumm and Clay Streets in the city’s North Financial District submarket. Boston Properties bought the skyscraper and its sister properties–One Embarcadero Center, Two Embarcadero and Three Embarcadero Center–in 1998….

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino announced that four projects totaling more than $75 million in private investment have received approvals from the Boston redevelopment authority’s board of directors. The first project approved is a residential building within the proposed Seaport Square project on the South Boston Waterfront. Known as Parcel A, it is one of 20 parcels that comprises the Seaport Square Project. The project will include 34 residential units occupying 54,400 square feet of residential space in a six-story building with ground-floor retail space. Construction is anticipated to begin in the second quarter of 2009 with an estimated completion date…

Two New York City office properties are back on the market, as a deal under which George Comfort & Sons would have acquired the assets–1540 Broadway and Worldwide Plaza–for some $2 billion has fallen through. The sale agreement was originally reached in mid-September, and at the time, was partially contingent on NBC leasing a large portion of Worldwide Plaza, which is located at 825 Eight Avenue. That lease never happened, and the deal has been nixed, according to Crain’s New York.With the original deal now dead, the buildings have begun to be remarketed. Crain’s cited experts who pegged the likely…

The Miami City commission has approved special district zoning for Miami Worldcenter (pictured), a nine-block mixed-use development situated north of the city’s Central Business District. Additionally, the commission also approved a development agreement ensuring the developer’s commitment to deliver open public space. Located on 25 acres, the project has more than 12 million square feet of buildable area and will be comprised of retail, residential, office and institutional uses. It sits within an  intermodal transit hub accessible by air, rail, sea and road. Surrounding amenities include the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, Bicentennial Park and the American Airlines…

While the real estate sector continues to take a beating by economic forces, there may be yet another peril on the horizon that could harm the industry just as much–if not more. According to a new report by the University of California, Berkeley, the state of California currently has a total of $2.5 trillion in real estate assets at risk from “extreme weather events,” such as wildfires and rising sea levels. That figure represents more than half of the $4 trillion in total real estate assets in the state, according to the report, which was released in the wake of…