MIDDLE MARKET HIGHLIGHT, OCTOBER 2007

Fort Wayne
Dan Marcec

The Fort Wayne commercial real estate market currently is experiencing healthy growth, mainly due to an established long-range community plan, population increase and an improvement of major roads throughout the region. While medical office, general office and hotel expansion are strong, the restaurant/retail market has been key to economic development. Areas where retail construction has been particularly active include the Illinois Road corridor in the southwest; the area surrounding Lima and Dupont roads in the northwest; and in the northeast, around the Interstate 469 and Maysville Road interchange.

Access to interstate highways and a burgeoning housing market have driven development in all these areas, and the Interstate 69 interchanges at Dupont Road in the north and West Jefferson Boulevard in the southwest have seen solid activity in the hospital and medical office sectors.

The Fort Wayne region continues to seek companies looking to expand and relocate in seven key areas, all of which also are industry segments sought by the state of Indiana economic development commission. These sectors include: distribution and logistics; aerospace and non-aerospace airport development; communications and defense contracting; financial services; life and material sciences; food and non-food agri-processing; and transportation.

“We’ve identified [these] industries as likely to provide economic and job stability for the foreseeable future,” says Ron Sheets, project manager for the Fort Wayne-Allen County Economic Development Alliance. “The Fort Wayne area also has an established history of business growth, job creation and employment stability in each of these areas, and the community’s strength in these key clusters serve to demonstrate its ability to give employers the support needed to thrive and prosper.”

Several important new projects have come online in the past year. Sheets explains that Transpoint LLC announced preliminary plans to develop a 300-acre intermodal ramp and logistics park on Fort Wayne Redevelopment Commission-owned land. “The ramp will be a key rail/truck interchange point for international shipping containers, and the park also will house ancillary distribution center, warehouse and truck terminal development,” he says.

Another significant project, the $30 million, 150,000-square-foot Sweetwater Sound campus, commenced construction in 2006 and completed its first phase earlier this year. Serving as a gateway to Fort Wayne from the west at 5501 U.S. Highway 30 West, Sweetwater’s second phase is now under construction, which will include recording studios, a training auditorium, and an atrium housing a restaurant and game room.

Furthermore, Great Ledge Development of St. Louis recently completed a 57,000-square-foot mixed-use building in the West Coast Tech Park. It is the first of two planned for the development.


©2007 France Publications, Inc. Duplication or reproduction of this article not permitted without authorization from France Publications, Inc. For information on reprints of this article contact Barbara Sherer at (630) 554-6054.