HOUSTON – As many as five office buildings, with an estimated 2 million square feet of office space, will be added to west Houston’s Energy Corridor on the site of the 35-acre Exxon Mobil Chemical complex, which will be demolished.
Houston-based PM Realty Group will be developing the Exxon site in conjunction with Atlas USA Holdings of Greenwich, Conn.
The Energy Corridor has one of the best occupancy rates in the county – the Class A occupancy rate is 99 percent – and 5.4 million sf of office is under construction now.
Planning for the development of the Exxon property is not complete. But Dan Leverett of PM Realty Group said four or five office buildings will be constructed on the 35-acre. In addition there will be a 350-room hotel, meeting space, retail, restaurants and apartments.
“Here, all of the corporate user’s needs will be met in one location, unlike the single purpose office park that forces users into automobiles to obtain amenities and services,” says Leverett.
The retail component will be skewed more toward services and restaurants that meet the needs of the corporate tenants, rather than a mall-type destination selling a lot of clothing. “We don’t want to be a soft goods retail development,” Leverett said.
Exxon Chemical sold the site and will be moving to North Houston where Exxon Mobil is developing a 400-acre campus.
Leverett said vertical construction could begin on PM Realty Group’s Energy Corridor site as early as 2015. But it will take several years for PM Realty/Atlas to build out the $1 billion project.
“Together, we intend to transform this highly desirable land into a distinctively special development, unparalleled in the Corridor, in which to live, work, play, and learn,” says Rick Kirk, PM Realty Group Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.
Exxon Mobil Chemical will continue to use its offices on the Katy Freeway until 2015 when it relocates to the new Exxon Mobil campus, just south of The Woodlands.
The Exxon Chemical site on the Katy Freeway is in the heart of Houston’s Energy Corridor, where scores of energy companies have their offices. The price of Exxon Chemical’s land was not disclosed, but it was a highly sought-after property and the ultimate sales price was huge.
“This site in the heart of the Energy Corridor, is without question one of the best in Houston, a city which is now a model for new development projects in the United States,” said Tim Relyea, Cushman & Wakefield Executive Vice Chairman, Brokerage. “Finding this size of tract within close proximity to the city is getting harder and harder to come by, so it represents an excellent development opportunity.”