Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services has begun constructing a 42,000 square foot speculative office building near the main entrance of the Corporate Center at East Mountain in Plains Township, Luzerne County.
The building is being constructed at the intersection of East Mountain Boulevard and Baltimore Drive on a 6.6 acre parcel.
Mericle has designed the single-story building to have a brick exterior, large windows, abundant parking, Class A interior finishes and professional landscaping, and expects the building to be attractive to medical professionals and financial and business services firms.
Steel will arrive on the site in May and the building will be ready for new tenants by the end of the year.
Mericle’s Vice President of Marketing Jim Cummings said the new building can be subdivided to as small as 3,500 square feet. “The building will have multiple entrances allowing us to be very flexible when it comes to accommodating the space needs of our tenants,” he said.
Ronald Filippini, chairman of the Plains Township Board of Commissioners, said the Township welcomes the project and is excited about the employment opportunities it will bring. “The building has the potential to house more than 200 jobs when it’s fully occupied,” said Filippini. “This is just the type of development activity we like bringing to Plains Township.”
“Mericle’s building will have a very positive impact on our local economy,” added Township Vice Chairman Brigid O’Connor. “We are pleased that we have been able to create a pro-business environment in Plains Township and we look forward to working with Mericle on similar projects in the future.”
The new facility will be the seventh constructed on speculation by Mericle in the Corporate Center at East Mountain and the fourth since the company announced a multi-year development plan in 2008 to construct 11 office buildings in the park. The 11 buildings will range in size from 15,000 square feet to 100,000 square feet and most will be constructed on speculation.
In August of 2011, Mericle began constructing a 25,200 square foot speculative office building on an adjacent site at 1175 East Mountain Boulevard. Construction on that building is wrapping up and Mericle is customizing the interior for a firm that has agreed to lease the entire building. Mericle expects the company to announce its move into the building sometime this spring.
Site work on the 6.6 acre parcel was completed in advance as 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.
Larry Newman, Vice President of Planning, Policy, and Development for the Greater Wilkes-Barre Chamber of Business and Industry, said Mericle’s ongoing speculative development program makes it easier for local economic development groups to help create new jobs. “Businesses seeking to grow and expand prefer a community where they can find the widest range of ready-to-go options that can accommodate their needs,” said Newman. “When we broaden our commercial and industrial real estate inventory, we position ourselves to compete most effectively in today’s marketplace.”
The buildings constructed by Mericle in the Corporate Center at East Mountain total 246,000 square feet. More than 1,000 people work in those buildings. Mericle’s park tenants include RCN, C3i, Merrill Lynch, Citadel Communications, Yellow Book, Hospice of the Sacred Heart, Geisinger, Jacobi Capital Management, and Liberty Mutual Insurance Company. Mericle also has its corporate headquarters in the park.
Founded by Robert K. Mericle in 1985, Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services has developed more than 16 million square feet of industrial, office, and flex space along Pennsylvania’s I-81 Corridor.
Mericle Commercial Real Estate Services, founded by Robert Mericle, has provided commercial real estate solutions to companies in Northeastern and North Central Pennsylvania for more than 30 years. Mericle is a developer of investment grade industrial, office, flex, and medical space and ReadyToGo!™ Sites. More than 13,400 people work in the buildings Mericle has developed.