EASTMARK GRAND OPENING

Where: Eastmark, in far southeast Mesa. When: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. June 1. What: Model homes from seven builders, music and daylong family activities. How to get there: Signal Butte Road or Ellsworth Road to Ray Road; the entrance is about midway between Signal Butte and Ellsworth. Website: eastmark.com. deepening recession in early 2009. Last year, Gaylord got out of the hotel-development business and sold its brand to Marriott International Inc.

That seemed to kill all hope for a Mesa Gaylord, but Taylor told the Mesa City Council in April that DMB continues to pursue resort opportunities and a Gaylord-branded hotel is not out of the question. Millions of dollars in voter-approved tax incentives still exist for that or another high-end resort.

The council also learned in April that DMB is accelerating its plans for an “executive enclave” and active-adult area south of Ray Road from where the current development is being built. Both of those developments will be under construction by next year, the company told the council.

Eastmark will be the largest private development in Mesa’s Gateway area, which is centered on the airport that emerged after Williams Air Force Base closed in 1993.

Mesa hopes that Gateway has the potential to become an economic powerhouse. Those expectations were enhanced by a 2006 Urban Land Institute study that said Mesa had been aiming too low in its planning for the area.

Mesa has since revised its expectations and is aiming for 100,000 high-paying jobs in and around the airport — many of them in Eastmark itself.