Buccini/Pollin Group intends to build this warehouse near the U.S. Route 13 interchange with Interstate 495, creating at least 50 jobs. | PHOTO COURTESY OF BPG
WILMINGTON – Buccini/Pollin Group (BPG), a leading commercial real estate development in Delaware, may be best known for its apartment and office buildings, but it will soon venture into new territory with the development of an industrial site in the South Market Street corridor.
The firm plans to continue its redevelopment of that stretch of U.S. Route 13 that it first began with the Chase Fieldhouse in 2019 by constructing a $25 million spec warehouse near the intersection of Heald Street and Rogers Road, just outside of city limits.
The 137,500-square-foot facility would sit near the Interstate 495 interchange, which would make it appealing to a variety of different end users targeting the mid-Atlantic market. It will also be the first Class A industrial space built in the Wilmington market in many years.
“We obviously have not been heavily involved in the industrial market – we may have missed a lot of that window – but this was a site that obviously, with its superior transportation connections and corridor, behooves an opportunity,” Mike Hare, vice president of development at BPG, told the state’s job investment board, the Council on Development Finance, on Monday.
Hare said that BPG invested more than $4 million to acquire the site and currently projects to spend $21 million to build the facility.
“As many of you know, probably by the time we put a shovel in the ground construction prices are still headed up and rents are headed down in this market. But we’re confident that if we improve the site and market it properly, we can attract a meaningful user and create jobs in this area,” he added.
On Monday, the CDF unanimously approved a $1 million Level II Site Readiness grant for the project that would support bringing utilities to the site, conducting stormwater management and completing other pad work in preparation for building. It is the 19th such grant approved since the Site Readiness grant program launched two years ago.
The 11-acre, which has been vacant for at least a decade, is currently zoned commercial regional and heavy industrial, and would not require a rezoning for construction to begin.
“The investment will complement recent and future development along South Market and Walnut streets and provide a more appealing gateway to the city of Wilmington,” said Becky Harrington, vice president of business development for the state’s public-private economic development organization, the Delaware Prosperity Partnership, which supported the project’s application. “The demand for industrial space in Delaware remains strong, especially near the Port of Wilmington and along the I-95 corridor. This project will place an obsolete property back in the market and provide new jobs and investment for Delaware.”
BPG projects that the project will create 80 to 90 construction jobs, and a minimum of 50 full-time employees, once an end user for the site has been identified. Although the facility, which will have 38 dock doors, could be subdivided to serve multiple tenants, Hare said BPG preferred to find a single user.
While likely that the site known as the I-495 Logistics Center would attract interest as a distribution center warehouse, BPG is open to any user, including light industrial manufacturing, Hare said.
