Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
New Hunt building planned
Offices will include restaurant, fitness center for employees
ROGERS — The area near the Arkansas Music Pavilion and Pinnacle Hills Promenade is adding another commercial project.
The City Council last week approved a rezoning for about 4 acres off West J.B. Hunt Drive where Hunt Ventures plans to build Hunt Plaza, according to documents submitted to the city.
Hunt Plaza will be an office building with a restaurant, parking garage and fitness center for employees, said Tom Allen, executive vice president of Sage Partners. Sage Partners recently merged with Hunt Ventures. Hunt Ventures is a real estate development firm.
Plans show a five-story, 129,000-square-foot building with an adjacent six-level parking garage.
Allen said Hunt Ventures would like to start construction as soon as the Planning Commission approves the plans. He expects the project to be completed in 2021.
He didn’t yet have a construction cost estimate.
Hunt Ventures is on track to finish a similar project, Northgate Plaza, by the end of the year, Allen said.
Northgate Plaza is a 110,000-square-foot, six-story office building with a parking garage next to Hunt Tower on West J.B. Hunt Drive. The first tenant plans to move in in January, he said.
Hunt Tower, a 10-story, 235,000-square-feet office building, is home to businesses such as Bayer HealthCare and law firm Smith Hurst PLC.
Northgate and Hunt Plaza each have space for eight to 16 tenants, Allen said.
Rogers had about 84,000 square feet of available office/warehouse space in the first half of 2019, compared with none in Fayetteville, about 123,000 square feet in Bentonville and about 203,000 square feet in Springdale, according to the Skyline Report released by Arvest Bank.
Rogers had an office/ warehouse vacancy rate of about 14%, compared with 0% in Fayetteville, about 13% in Bentonville and about 10% in Springdale, according to the report.
Hunt Plaza is the latest in a string of developments in the Pinnacle area. John McCurdy, community development director for the city, has said the goal for that part of Rogers to be the “downtown” of Northwest Arkansas. The city is trying to discourage single-use, single-story developments, such as strip malls, and opt for mixed-use, multiple story buildings, he said.
Texas-based Topgolf expects to open its first Arkansas location next to the AMP in 2020, said Morgan Schaaf, spokeswoman. The venue offers food, beverages, music and a driving range for point-scoring golf games using microchipped balls. The project is being built on 11 acres north of Pauline Whitaker Parkway and west of Interstate 49. The company previously said the project would create 300 fulltime and part-time jobs, and expect 250,000 customers annually.
The Walton Arts Center, which owns the AMP, announced in November the venue would expand in time for its 2020 concert series. The expansion will allow up to 11,000 people to attend concerts, an increase from 10,000. The expansion will include a new box office and a larger main entry plaza with more concession stands and restrooms.
Mixed-use projects that combine residential, office and retail space such as Uptown Square off of South Pinnacle Hills Parkway, Pinnacle Village off Pauline Whitaker Parkway and Pinnacle Heights off of South Champions Drive, are also
Plans show a five-story, 129,000-squarefoot building with an adjacent six-level parking garage.
in the works in the Pinnacle Hills area.
Uptown Square plans 260 multifamily units, 20,000 square feet of retail space and 7,500 square feet of office space.
Pinnacle Heights is to include a hotel and restaurant, retail space, a 300-unit apartment complex with a pool and fitness center and 10 live/work units that can rent as both residential and office or work space. There also will be space for parks, an amphitheater and food trucks.
Pinnacle Village is to include townhouses, apartments, office and retail space, space for food trucks, a clubhouse, tennis and basketball courts, a pool, a dog park, a hotel and two parking garages.
Raymond Burns, president and chief executive officer at the Rogers-Lowell Area Chamber of Commerce, said developers wouldn’t be building office space if they couldn’t attract businesses to lease it.
“People want to be where the services are,” Burns said. “They’re going to want to live there, but also going to want to work there.”