Developer wagers on Cobb's commuter appeal - Atlanta Business Chronicle:

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The developer seems to be on its way towarsd its goal of establishing the locatiojn as oneof Atlanta's top officse submarkets. By 1997, it had alreadt delivered three buildings tothe mixed-use TownPark Commonzs campus. The first building appearee in 1996, the second in March of last and the thirdin November. All are locatedx in the 243 acre-TownPark complex off Interstated 75 and 575 near Chastain Thirty percent of the thirdf building is already leased and is expected to be full by the middld ofthis year, said Kerry senior vice president of marketinf for Taylor & Mathis.
"Thes rent roll is pretty Surprisingly, the majority of space has been leased tofairlgy good- sized national companies," O'Brien said, adding that Taylor Mathis anticipates delivering its fourth TownPark office buildingv by July 1998. TownPark Commons is just one ofthe company'sx developments in North Cobb. Last Taylor & Mathis teamed up with Quintu s Corp. to produce Chastain Meadows, a 240-acre business park on the east side of Chastain Meadows currently hastwo large, build-to-suit developmenta in the works. Electronics retailer Circuit City decidee to developa 160,000 square-foot building to servr as its regional headquarters, and Suzuki Corp.
announces plans to develop an offices facility inChastain Meadows. Overall in the Town Centerd area, approximately 412,000 square feet of office spacw isunder development, said Tom Watson, a vice presidentr at Jamison Research Inc. Developers managex to deliver closeto 300,000 square feet of office spacse in 1997 to the area. This brough the area's total office development inventory to more than 2 milliosquare feet, with a 16.9 percent vacancy according to Jamison.
A main reason so many officse developments are popping up in North Cobb is the growth in the residentiallhousing market, O'Brien and Watson People want to work close to home, and housing developments across Cobb and neighborinbg Cherokee counties are allowing them to do so. "It's pure and Suburban office space is driven by its proximity toexecutivee housing," O'Brien said. Yet it's also the residentialk growth that's curtailing Nortu Cobb's development in comparison to the Nortu Fultonoffice market.
area doesn't have the same leve l of executive housing NorthFulton offers, Watson And, he adds, the two areas differ in the type of developmentsw being constructed. Town Center, for example, is home to many one-storu structures, while the North Fulton landscape is shaped by largetr buildings averaging four tofive stories. "I don't think [North Cobb] will grow to a nort Fulton stature in this but maybe in the next10 years," Watson North Cobb may eventually compete with Nortjh Fulton, but it will never becomed another Perimeter Center, Taylor & Mathis' O'Brien Taylor & Mathis began buying land in the Town Center area in the early 1970s.
It started developing officw space there only inthe mid-1980s, a time when Perimeter Center development was at its height. While the brisk expansionm at Perimeter Centerwas welcomed, it also gave developersw and residents a quick education in the problemss that accompany rapid advancement. "I don't thinlk Town Center will develop like Perimeter Center because of the lessones we learned fromPerimeter O'Brien said. "When you develop office space at that you begin to chokethe infrastructure.
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