Posted: 7:00 a.m.Sunday, Dec. 21, 2014

Butler County riding boom development cycle afterthe bust
By Chelsey Levingston
Staff Writer

BUTLER COUNTY — 

    If the construction cranes towering overboth sides of Ohio 129 entering Butler Countyare any indication, the next wave of development in this hot spot between Cincinnati and Daytonhas arrived.

    Commercial development activity in ButlerCounty is rising back to pre-recession levels, and a lot of it’s happening atthe same time thanks to once-in-a-lifetime projects such as the mega shoppingand office complex Liberty Center and a proton therapy center being built atCincinnati Children’s Liberty Campus for cancer treatment.

    “What you’re seeing right now is thecommercial response to years of residential development and growth,” said ChrisWunnenberg, director of development for     Schumacher Construction Dugan Inc., a WestChester Twp.-based property development and management company.

    More than 3,000 non-residential buildingpermits were approved through the end of November across ButlerCounty townships, Trenton and New Miami. A year ago, 2,945permits were approved, according to the county’s development department.

    Commercial activity is also trending higherover recent post-recession years in Fairfield, Hamilton and Middletown.

    “Right now it means new investment, new jobopportunities, new shopping opportunities and better health care options,”Wunnenberg said.

    For example, five new hotels are in variousstages of construction along the Interstate 75 corridor in West Chester and Liberty townships andSharonville. A sixth hotel, Hilton Garden Inn, was the first to open inSeptember.

    Other construction started this yearincludes two outdoor sporting goods stores — Bass Pro Shops and Cabela’s Inc. —in West Chester Twp.; the Artspace Lofts in downtown Hamilton, which includes42 artist apartments on top of commercial space; a health rehabilitation centerCovenant Village of Middletown; and an all new auto supply plant in Monroe forUGN Inc.

    Meanwhile, MiamiUniversity’s rural Oxford campus has turned into a constructionzone during the last five years as officials have renovated or demolisheddozens of buildings. More than $400 million has been spent since 2009, withmore work to go, said    David Creamer, Miami’s vice presidentfor finance and business services.

    New business announcements signal what elsecould come. Business projects announced for next year that could lead to morenew construction include a “significant” forthcoming announcement from TheChrist Hospital Health Network, plans for a natural-gas fired power plant in Middletown and the secondphase to add more retail space at The Streets of West Chester.

    “I can’t tell you if this is the start ofanother development wave or if when we finish this, we’ll be sitting aroundlooking at each other the next 10 years,” Wunnenberg said.

    “But I can tell you it’s busy right now.”

    Many of the business projects now coming tofruition spent years in planning and design, and were delayed by the recessionand hard-to-get financing.

    “At least in Fairfield we’re seeing in 2014 a lot ofexisting companies doing some expansion projects,” said Greg Kathman, thecity’s economic development manager.

    “My impression is that companies that maybea few years ago when the recession was happening, they were having some hardtimes, but now they’re coming out of that,” Kathman said. “They’re having somegrowth in business, and they feel they can comfortably move forward with somelarge scale expansion.”

    The single largest construction project tostart shoveling dirt in 2014 was the approximately $350 million Liberty Center,located in Liberty Twp. at the intersection of Interstate 75, Ohio 129 andLiberty Way. Slated for a fall 2015 opening, the complex consists of more than1 million-square-feet of combined shopping, dining, residential and officespace.

    Spread over more than 60 acres,construction involves as many as 15 major structures, including three parkinggarages, according to developer Steiner + Associates, the same company thatbuilt Easton TownCenter in the Columbusarea and The Greene Town Center in Beavercreek.

    It’s a project so massive that Butler Countywill have to hire an outside company to help with the electrical and buildinginspections during the approaching crunch time ahead of opening, said DavidFehr, development director for the county.

“Thisis a lot of concentration,” Fehr said. “Secondly, the thing the makes itchallenging is the speed at which they want it done.”

    “We’re going to scrutinize it just as wewould any other project,” he added.

Speculativeconstruction is back, when developers build space without a tenant in mind. Instead,they expect to lure an occupant with ready-to-go facilities. Schumacher DuganConstruction this year started and completed a speculative office building,which is the second office building of three planned at its Union Centre Office Park in West ChesterTwp.

    In fact, West Chester Twp. currently hasthe tightest office submarket in terms of available space in the entire Cincinnati region with a4.2 percent vacancy rate, said James Flick, vice president of research andmarketing for Cassidy Turley Commercial Real Estate Services.

    Additionally, two speculative industrialbulk buildings are under construction totaling 800,000-square- feet at Port Union Commerce Park,near the West Chester Twp. and Fairfieldborder, Flick said.

    “To see the return of speculativeconstruction in not only the industrial market, which has seen a fasterrecovery than the office market, but in the office market shows a positive signthat the entire region is seeing the recovery move a little faster,” Flicksaid.

Thingsare picking up, but new development has been steady even during the recenteconomic downtown in West Chester Twp., said Mike Juengling, the township’scommunity development director and former director of development for Butler County.One example is West Chester Hospital, which opened in2009.

    “We certainly have more projects now thanwe had a year or so ago,” Juengling said. “But I don’t think it’s anything wehaven’t seen before.”

    While suburban sprawl can be criticized forbuilding brand new when there’s plenty of vacant space to be filled elsewhere,Wunnenberg says development follows where people want to live.

    When Cabela’s searches for a site to open anew store, it looks at catalog and online sales to pinpoint areas where thespecialty retailer already has a strong customer base and opportunities togrow, said spokesman Nathan Borowski. From there, Cabela’s scours the map forgrowing population areas interested in outdoor recreation.

    Another driving factor in where Cabela’schooses to open a new store is based on locations that provide easy highwayaccess and high visibility. For all those reasons, the Nebraskacompany settled on the Liberty Wayand Interstate 75 intersection for its second Ohio store.

    “We thought it would be a great locationfor our customers in the Cincinnati area as wellas the Daytonarea,” Borowski said.

    “There’s already a draw for customers tovisit that area. We see some potential for that area to grow,” he said.

BUTLER COUNTY’S BIGGEST CONSTRUCTIONPROJECTS OF 2014

TheJournal-News asked local government development departments to provideinformation for the single largest commercial building project in theirjurisdictions, based on values listed on building permits approved in 2014.

$350 million Liberty Center, the shopping, dining, residential andoffice complex under construction in Liberty Twp.

$11.8 million Artspace Hamilton Lofts, a renovation of the former Hamilton Center to create 42 artist live/workunits, plus 3,000-square-feet of ground floor commercial space.

$13 million Covenant Village of Middletown, a post surgery rehabilitationcenter

$2.2 million repair of Express Scripts roof in Fairfield