Lincoln Property Co. Breaking Ground On $265M Westside Mixed-Use Project

Lincoln Property Co. will start speculative development this week on 300K SF of office at Echo Street West in Midtown, a company executive told Bisnow.

The real estate firm has obtained construction financing for the $265M first phase of Echo Street West, which is planned for 292 apartment units, 50K SF of retail and 300K SF of office, LPC Executive Vice President Tony Bartlett said in an email.

Dallas-based Lincoln Property expects to break ground this week, with delivery on the apartments set for late 2022 and the remaining project in early 2023. Bartlett declined to disclose the lender, only saying a loan was closed "with a national lending institution" and that it was obtained despite having no pre-leasing with any office tenants.

Echo Street West, located just west of Georgia Tech's campus and about a mile from Westside Park and Mercedes-Benz Stadium, is situated in a designated opportunity zone. That could provide a lure for LPC to attract tenants into the project; a business can obtain qualified opportunity fund investment so long as half of its revenue stream is derived from activity within the opportunity zone.

The 19-acre project, near the Atlanta BeltLine's westside path in the English Avenue neighborhood, is also set to include a 20K SF adaptive reuse events space called Guardian Works and Guardian Studios, a 16K SF artists studio. LPC has tapped the organization Black Women in Visual Arts to curate the 14 artist studios at Guardian Studios, Bartlett said.

Echo Street West is the latest project to rise in Midtown, especially in its hot Westside area. As of March, developers were underway with 11 office buildings in Midtown encompassing 3.8M SF, according to Colliers. Projects underway include Selig Enterprises' 1105 West Peachtree, which has been mostly pre-leased by Google; Midtown Union; Star Metals District; 650 West Peachtree St., which is the new headquarters for Norfolk Southern, and The Interlock.

Despite the thumping Atlanta's office market experienced earlier this year as a result of the coronavirus pandemic and uncertainty among small and midsized companies, optimism reigns in Midtown as a number of tenants exploring the market for new space, including Airbnb, or planning major campuses like Microsoft, which is set to occupy all of Hines' Atlantic Yards project at Atlantic Station and acquired 90 acres next to Westside Park for a future mixed-use campus.

Last week, Bisnow reported that iHeartmedia was in talks to lease 25K SF at Selig's The Works in Midtown's Upper Westside, moving its operations from its current home in Buckhead.

Other developers have started projects on spec in the submarket as well, including Greenstone Properties, which is developing its 312K SF 14th + Spring project and plans to deliver next July.

Portman announced plans to launch a 500K SF office tower at the site of H.M. Patterson & Son Spring Hill Chapel funeral home on spec by the spring of next year, and New City Properties recently acquired 19 acres at 930 Marietta Blvd., a site that abuts Westside Park roughly a mile northeast of Microsoft's new land, for a future mixed-use project.