More speculative warehouse development is envisioned in West Jacksonville.
City utility JEA issued a service availability determination letter March 25 for a prospective speculative 186,680-square-foot industrial building near Directors Road in Westlake Industrial Park.
The application calls it a spec building with general industrial use and no end user has been determined.
A JEA application means a project is being explored and does not mean a deal is completed nor imminent.
Kimley-Horn and Associates Inc. of Jacksonville is the civil engineer.
Swift Transportation Co. of Arizona is the owner of the 14.95-acre site along Pritchard Road near Directors Road. Swift has not responded to a call or email for comment.
Swift Transportation bought the site in November 2018 from Westlake 11 LLC of Irvine, California, for $1.185 million.
The land is next to Pattillo Industrial Real Estate’s Westlake TradeCenter.
Pattillo affiliate Stone Mountain Industrial Park Inc., through Westlake Land LLC, bought 96.3 acres at Pritchard and Directors roads from Denver-based Prologis Inc. in 2016 for about $7.2 million and registered Westlake TradeCenter as a fictitious name with the state.
On that land, Pattillo developed a 486,000-square-foot building that it has leased to Iron Mountain on 30.77 acres at 9950 Pritchard Road.
Pattillo also has a 30.64-acre site next to that at 10070 Pritchard Road that is designed for a 460,000-square-foot distribution center for cross-dock trucking. No construction has begun.
Through Westlake Land LLC, Pattillo sold 35 acres to New Jersey-based Sudler Companies in December 2024. Sudler is exploring construction of a 345,000-square-foot distribution/manufacturing warehouse that could be expanded to 600,000 square feet in a second phase.
Called “DRG Directors Road,” the JEA application is for vacant land owned by Swift Transportation, which bought it in 2018 from Westlake 11 LLC of Irvine, California. That LLC bought the land in 2008.
The application refers to Distribution Realty Group, which was founded in 2013 as a private industrial real estate company with offices in Nashville, Tennessee, and Kansas City, Missouri.
DRG had no comment on the application.
The distributionrealty.com site says the investment firm has acquired and developed 8.5 million square feet of industrial properties with a total market capitalization topping $785 million.
In Florida, it owns the 196,086-square-foot Narcoossee Distribution Center in Orlando.
Phoenix-base Knight-Swift Transportation Holdings Inc. calls itself a freight transportation company that provides truckload transportation and logistics services. It uses a nationwide network of business units and terminals in the United States and Mexico to serve customers throughout North America.
The Jacksonville Planning Commission approved a zoning exception in November 2018 for outside storage for a trailer transfer between customers and manufacturers for Swift Transportation.
The zoning application described the operation as truck distribution center for trailer transfers from manufacturers to customers’ distribution centers.
Plans showed a 19,800-square-foot office and shop building on the site. Parking was provided for 119 standard and five accessible spaces, 93 tractors and 159 trailers.
The site also is near the BJ's Wholesale Club distribution center at 4500 Directors Road.
Pattillo Vice President of Development Peter Anderson said April 1 what other industry professionals have said.
“Tenant demand has normalized to a healthy economy,” he said.
“Speculative construction has not normalized and remains elevated so we are seeing an over supply in certain markets.”
Atlanta-based Rooker Vice President Cason Bufe said March 19 that he thinks there is momentum in tenant activity in the bigger size ranges.
Rooker, a real estate development, design and construction management firm, wants to more than double the size of its proposed warehouse on Jacksonville Aviation Authority surplus industrial property in North Jacksonville.
“The leasing has been slow generally this year in the last six months, slower than we would like, but I know there are a number of tenants in the market in all size ranges that are looking for space. We are hoping a lot of leases will get signed in the next 30 to 60 days,” he said.
The JAA board agreed to an amended lease agreement with Rooker to allow it to develop a minimum of 400,000 square feet of Class A warehouse space, up from the previously approved 288,000 square feet. City utility JEA received a service availability determination request for the warehouse to expand to 650,000 square feet.