Coming in for a Landing
A conical roof was lowered onto the building south of Pancheri Drive, which is scheduled for completion in June.
In any property development, there’s a point where the people behind it say, “Now this is starting to look like something.”
For Ball Ventures, the company behind the Snake River Landing project south of Pancheri Drive, that moment was last week, when it put a 10,000-pound conical cap on the turret of its first big building.
The project, on the old Monroc Construction property, has been four or five years in the planning. Work began in earnest in 2006, and because of its location by one of the busiest streets in Idaho Falls, the project got plenty of notice.
But Cortney Liddiard, Ball Ventures’ CEO, said the company has been reluctant to seek much press before now because officials wanted to get the uncertainties of starting a project behind them.
Though it doesn’t yet have a name, the 50,000-square-foot turreted building offers a glimpse of where owner Allen Ball and his people are taking things.
Ball and Liddiard describe the architectural style as “Main Street,” echoing the traditional styles found downtown but allowing for a wide variety of materials and colors.
“We want to have something that invites everyone to come,” Liddiard said.
Inside the building, the ground floor has 6,400 square feet of space for a restaurant and more than 12,000 square feet for retail. Upstairs is office space, 10,000 square feet for Ball Ventures.
Although the building should be finished by the end of June, work on Milligan Road and the land along the river still needs to be completed. Ball Ventures officials hope to have the street improvements done by fall and tenants moved in sometime in 2008.
Besides themselves, officials have found no definite tenants yet. But Eric Isom, the company’s vice president for development and real estate, said the demand for quality office space is good, both from companies already here and those that want to relocate to Idaho Falls.
“It’s people who are looking for a nicer, newer space,” he said. “There’s a lot of activity shifting back to the west side.”
The Snake River Landing’s first phase includes about 250,000 square feet of office space. But so far, there are only two buildings — the turreted building and one next door, which the company is collaborating on with G.L. Voigt Development.
For the past 10 years, Voigt has been at the forefront of putting up “spec” buildings — space that isn’t built for a particular customer at the outset but attractive enough to lure a desirable tenant quickly. Isom said it’s a selling point for the company to be partnered with a developer as respected as Voigt.
Overall, the company has 450 acres between Pancheri Drive and Sunnyside Road to work with. Its goal is to transform the area from an industrial site into a place where people work, eat, play and shop.
That’s pretty much in keeping with most towns in America that have rivers running through them.
“There is a trend nationally of people recognizing the value of the river,” Isom said.
One thing Ball Ventures and its general contractor, Bateman-Hall, have paid particular attention to is hiring local subcontractors to work on the project.
There are a couple of advantages, said Mike Clements, Bateman-Hall’s man on the job. It’s a group of people who are used to working with each other and know how to communicate. And there’s a spirit on the job that brings excitement to the project.
“We think that’s a great thing for the community,” said Isom, who moved to Idaho Falls from Utah to be part of the project.
Story by Paul Menser. Originally posted at: Post Register
