St. John Properties, Inc. has begun work on property, a 60,000 square foot office building, as well as an adjacent ten-acre parcel of land at The Government and Technology Enterprise (GATE) project, a 413-acre business community positioned within the Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG) in Harford County.
Earlier this summer, the Baltimore-based real estate company was awarded exclusive development rights to The GATE project, which can support up to two million square feet of Class "A" single and multi-story space, as well as research and development/flex space. Both assets were formerly owned by Opus East LLC, the division of Opus Corporation which filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection in July 2009.
The single-story, research and development building located at 6240 Guardian Gateway was completed last June and is 100 percent leased to CACI International, Inc., a Northern Virginia-headquartered company that provides national security, defense, and intelligence-related solutions in the national interest of the United States. CACI, in turn, is subleasing 45,000 square feet of space in the building to the U.S. Army Joint Satellite Command. The building has a direct hardwire connection to the secure IT network of APG.
The ten-acre adjacent development parcel, which is rough graded and includes underground utilities, can support a three-story 75,000 square foot office building. St. John Properties plans on starting construction in the near future on this parcel which features prominent visibility along Maryland Boulevard, the main entrance into APG providing 24/7 access for federal employees, contractors and visitors. The Maryland Boulevard entrance into APG recently underwent a $23 million upgrade to improve access into the installation.
"Both assets are the perfect complement to our planned commercial and retail real estate program at The GATE, as we envision significant development activity in both the short and near-term in this region," says Jerry Wit, Senior Vice President�Marketing for St. John Properties. "The CACI building provides us with a fully-leased, operating project with a highly-recognized and credit-worthy company, while the adjacent land holding offers us immediate development opportunities to react to growing office space demand."
Maryland Boulevard is also the main entrance to the new 2.4 million square foot U.S. Army Command, Control, Computer, Communication, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C4ISR) operations, that is expected to be delivered in third quarter 2010. It is anticipated that as many as 10,000 workers will relocate to APG by 2011 from existing facilities in Fort Monmouth, New Jersey and elsewhere. The relocation of C4ISR to Harford County is generally recognized as the primary driver that will stimulate BRAC-related commercial real estate activities over the next twenty years.
"After hearing for the past several years about the expected BRAC effect on the Maryland economic climate, we can now see tangible activities that support those forecasts. Every indication suggests that Aberdeen Proving Ground will be the home of government contractors imbedded with various military commands and assignments. St. John Properties intends to play a major role by supplying essential real estate product and services," Jerry Wit continues.
St. John Properties has initiated grading operations on a portion of the property in anticipation of constructing up to five research and development and office buildings totaling between 150,000 and 200,000 square feet of space. These initial projects are designed to satisfy the backlog of commercial real estate space that presently exists at the GATE project. Over the predicted twenty-year build-out phase that St. John Properties expects to develop product at the business community, the company will invest a considerable amount of money for grading and the installation of necessary infrastructure improvements.
Source: Jerry Wit
Writer: Walaika Haskins