The Ecovillage at Currumbin is an innovative 110-hectare (272 ac), 144-unit residential community that showcases best practices in ecologically sustainable residential development. Conceived and implemented with minimal resources by a small group of individuals who wished to inspire improved practices in land development, the project is being developed on degraded farmland on the exurban fringe of Gold Coast City, a major resort city on Queensland’s Pacific Ocean coast. The project site is seven minutes from the shore. The developer, Landmatters Currumbin Valley Property Ltd., has rehabilitated the site and is protecting its environmental integrity and biodiversity by preserving 50 percent of it as an environmental reserve, netting 80 percent of the property as open space.
When Hurricane Paulina swept inland in October 1997, one of the hardest-hit locales was Acapulco. The all-important tourism industry was devastated for about two weeks, while the suffering experienced by the people who serviced that industry—people who lived inland in makeshift squatter housing built on hillsides, riversides, and other marginal land—lasted for months thereafter. Landslides, floods, and 290-kilometer-per-hour (180 mph) winds left 400,000 people homeless and 400 dead in Acapulco alone.
From 1929 through 1995, Stapleton International Airport served as Denver’s municipal airport. By 1987, plans were underway to build a new, state-of-the-art airport farther east, and they met voter approval in 1989. Meanwhile, a nonprofit group of civic and business leaders, working in partnership with the city of Denver, formed the Stapleton Development Foundation to determine the disposition of the soon-tobe-redundant Stapleton airport. In 1999, based on the foundation’s guidelines for development, the city selected Forest City Enterprises to be the master developer of the publicly owned site—located just five miles from downtown—which offered the largest urban redevelopment opportunity in Denver’s history. Today, the former airport is being reborn as a 4,700-acre (1,902 ha) master-planned community that, at buildout, will contain more than 12,000 homes, 13 million square feet (1.2 million m2) of commercial development, and more than 1,100 acres (445 ha) of parks and open space. Construction began in 2001, and the first phase, Stapleton District 1, was substantially complete in 2005. Encompassing 489 acres (198 ha), District 1 contains 2,100 residences—ranging from rental apartments to single-family homes, in many styles and price ranges—plus 200,000 square feet (18,580 m2) of office and industrial space, 120,000 square feet (11,148 m2) of retail space, more than 100 acres (40 ha) of parks and open space, and four schools. Reversing the traditional “retail follows rooftops” approach, Forest City built two retail centers in the project’s first year. Although the community is only 25 percent complete, District 1 already offers a mature, walkable, mixed-use community that is home to 4,500 residents.
A 1,045-acre neotraditional planned community centered on a 100-acre town center and a 73-acre lake. The plan calls for 3,370 residential units–of which 300 are completed–as well as retail and employment uses, including a recently completed Apple Computer facility. The development has a pedestrian- friendly environment, including attractive streetscapes, an accessible lake- front, and a planned mixed-use town center featuring shops, a village green, and a community center.
A 7,500-acre business, aviation, and industrial trade complex developed via a unique public/private partnership that included federal, state, local, and private entitles.
A 375,912-square-foot facility comprising two industrial warehouse buildings, developed by Catellus Development Corporation in 1991. The concrete tilt-up facility is strategically located near the San Jose and San Francisco airports, making it an ideal distribution hub for West Coast markets. The facility is designed for high-speed, high-volume distribution (high-throughput distribution) rather than storage, and it caters to companies seeking just-in-time delivery to businesses and consumers. The facility was purchased by AMB Property Corporation in 1993. AMB’s Customer Alliance Group targets high-growth dotcom companies as tenants and helps them overcome their logistical challenges through specialized facility design and leasing terms.
The O’Hare Express Center is a 945,000-square-foot air cargo facility constructed on the grounds of Chicago’s O’Hare Airport by CenterPoint Properties. The 50-acre project is the first privately developed facility permitted at O’Hare, and it represents an advance in public/private sector partnering for airport-related industrial development. To date, four of the six planned office/warehouse structures have been completed, for such major air shippers as Burlington Air, DHL, Inc., Air Canada, and Alliance Air.
A 23-acre business park located ten minutes north of the San Francisco International Airport. The project features both build-to-suit and speculative development. Developed in three phases, the buildings within Gateway Business Park were designed with tenant flexibility in mind. The glass storefronts of the precast concrete buildings can be configured in various combinations of windows, doors, loading doors, and solid panels. The prototypical U-shaped design of the buildings allows for an interior court that tenants can use for parking or loading or enclose as interior warehouse space.
CenterPoint Intermodal Center-Elwood (CIC-Elwood) is a 2,500-acre (1,012-ha) integrated logistics center used for the transfer, distribution, and warehousing of consumer materials and goods. Located in Elwood, Illinois, 50 miles (80 km) southwest of Chicago, the brownfield redevelopment includes a 775-acre (317-ha) intermodal terminal–a facility for the transfer of freight from rail to trucks. CIC-Elwood also contains 8 million square feet (743,224 sq m) of warehouse and distribution space in eight structures. In 2012, when the project is expected to be completed, it will contain approximately 12 million square feet (1.1 million sq m) of warehouse space in 15 buildings, with a total investment approaching $1 billion in public and private financing.
A 205-acre multiuse business park consisting primarily of attractively designed warehouse/distribution buildings. The project also includes a 300,000- square-foot power retail center and a 100,000-square-foot retail/office center providing space for smaller users. The project is heavily landscaped and designed to much higher standards than most warehouse projects of its kind.
