Months before it even officially opens, the Atlanta Braves and its partner developers could already be eyeing an expansion of SunTrust Park. This time with more office space.
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Atlanta Braves president Derek Schiller told our audience at yesterday's Atlanta 2016 Roundup & Outlook at the InterContinental in Buckhead that demand for office at The Battery mixed-use portion of SunTrust Park has been strong, and could precipitate developers moving forward on a second phase of the project.
“We feel strongly that we are going to be launching that here pretty soon,” Derek said.
The Braves have already scored two office runs at the new project—Comcast's nine-story project and most recently Regus planning to operate its co-working concept Spaces in 90k SF.
With the office space all subscribed and more demand out there, Derek says developers may push for more space on parcels stretching beyond the northeast and southwest side of The Battery.
But he quickly pointed out to Bisnow in a private Q&A session that the office space would need substantial pre-leasing before shovels would hit the dirt. “We're not going to be doing a 100% spec building for obvious reasons,” he said.
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Derek was part of a panel of high-profile development names that included Burr Forman's G. Wilson “Rocky” Horde, AMB Group's Steve Cannon, Daniel Corp's Pat Henry and Gateway Development's Mack Reese.
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Steve, formerly the CEO of Mercedes-Benz and instrumental in the luxury automaker's decision to relocate its US HQ from New Jersey to Atlanta, is now leading the investment arm of Falcons owner Arthur Blank that's building the new Mercedes-Benz Stadium. He said the new stadium will be more walkable and “more Millennial and more diverse” than other pure-play football stadiums since the Atlanta United soccer team will also play there.
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Pat said he is concerned that economic headwinds worldwide could end up affecting the local economy, especially since we've already experienced the largest peacetime economic expansion in modern times.
“If things slow down more...we could be facing a recession in 2018,” Pat said. Despite recent spikes in the interest rate, Mack says the federal debt will likely keep that capped for the time being.
As for Steve's concern, that revolves around the Falcons stadium's most notable feature: “I think the biggest thing that keeps me up at night is will the roof open when I push the button.”
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