Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services, the developer of the fast-growing CenterPoint Commerce & Trade Park in Jenkins and Pittston Townships, has begun constructing a 120,416 square foot speculative flex building in the park.
Work is well underway on the project site, a 22.78 acre parcel located at 501-575 Keystone Avenue in Jenkins Township. Steel will arrive on the site in April.
The new building will be the first constructed by Mericle in CenterPoint East’s new Phase IIC section. Like Mericle’s other flex buildings, the facility has been designed to accommodate manufacturing, distribution, office, and medical firms. However, this building will be the most visible built in the park to date.
“The building will be located a stone’s throw from I-81 and I-476 and will be seen from both highways,” said Mericle Vice President Bob Besecker. “This one will really get your attention as you drive by.”
Besecker estimates that the building will house four to eight tenants and more than 100 jobs when fully occupied.
The facility will be able to be subdivided as small as 12,083 square feet and will have an attractive masonry and glass façade. Features include abundant parking, energy efficient heating and lighting, 13 loading doors and a ceiling clear height from 30’1” to 34’3”.
Besecker said the building will be ready for tenants in late summer, 2012.
The building will be the 20th developed by Mericle in CenterPoint since 2005 and will grow the total square feet constructed in the park to 5.5 million. Close to 3,000 people work in CenterPoint.
Rosemary Dessoye, Executive Vice President of the Greater Pittston Chamber of Commerce, said the Chamber looks forward to marketing the new facility to local and national companies. “We often interact with executives who want highly visible, easily accessible space,” she said. “This new building will offer both of those qualities so I am very optimistic that it will be leased in short order.”
The speculative building will be the third constructed by Mericle in the past 10 months. Mericle just finished a 108,939 square foot flex building in CenterPoint West in Pittston Township and is nearing completion on a 25,200 square foot office building at the entrance to the Corporate Center at East Mountain in Plains Township.
In January, Mericle announced that it will construct a 96,000 square foot flex building in the Jessup Small Business Center, Jessup Borough.
Two companies have already signed leases for the 108,939 square foot CenterPoint West building and a third firm is expected to sign soon according to Besecker.
“The two new companies have leased a combined 21,475 square feet,” he said. “We expect them to announce their moves into CenterPoint West shortly.”
Besecker said both companies supply products to the commercial and residential construction industries. He said CenterPoint has quickly become a preferred destination for companies that supply the building trades.
“With our two new tenants we now have 12 companies in CenterPoint that provide products and services to the construction industry,” said Besecker. “Contractors can now drive to CenterPoint and make multiple stops in short order. This type of convenience allows them to spend more hours at their job sites rather than driving all over town to pick up supplies.”
Besecker said the third company that is expected to lease space in the CenterPoint West spec building is a medical related firm.
The new flex buildings are part of Mericle’s Ready to Go Program, an initiative to fully prepare dozens of building pads and construct new speculative industrial, office and flex buildings in nine local business parks. The program will result in the preparation of more than 1,700 acres from Scranton to Hazleton and the construction of 12.8 million square feet of space. Mericle estimates that the newly constructed buildings will house more than 12,000 jobs.
“Having sites and spec buildings that are ready to go gives Northeastern Pennsylvania a big advantage over competing areas,” said Besecker.
Founded by Robert K. Mericle in 1985, Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services has developed more than 16 million square feet of industrial, flex, and office space along Pennsylvania’s I-81 Corridor.
Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services, founded by Rob Mericle, is a vertically-integrated company with more than 200 in-house professionals with expertise in all aspects of commercial real estate development and construction. The Mericle team includes licensed architects, land planners, professional engineers, surveyors, licensed electricians, plumbers, carpenters, certified public accountants, in-house legal counsel, leasing and marketing professionals, licensed brokers, property managers, and more.