A commercial developer plans to invest $30 million to create several warehouses in a Hanover County business park.
The Devon USA investment would be the biggest in Hanover since 2000, when a peak-power generating facility spent roughly $50 million on an expansion.
The Richmond-based, privately held developer is buying 54 acres in NorthLake business park to build up to 1 million square feet of warehouse space, or four large warehouses. The warehouses are being built on a speculative basis and will be leased to clients.
Hanover Economic Development Director Marc Weiss estimated that if all the warehouses are built, they could employ 400 workers.
“This is a regional economic story,” Weiss said. He noted that Devon has also recently built the new warehousing and logistics center for DuPont in Chesterfield County.
Devon Vice President Ed Mitchell said the company has built or has under construction almost 2 million square feet of warehouse/distribution space in the Interstate 95 corridor south of Richmond.
“We wanted to have a project that would serve tenants that were looking for space that wanted to be in the I-95 corridor, but wanted to be on the north side of town,” Mitchell said.
The 350-acre NorthLake park is at the Interstate 95/Lewistown Road interchange.
Devon wants to begin construction on the first warehouse in June. The precast concrete warehouses will be one story tall, with 32-foot ceilings.
Since the I-95 site was rezoned for NorthLake a few years ago, four facilities have been built. Three are being designed, and one is under construction. The investment in the four completed buildings is about $15 million, Weiss said.
Once built, Devon’s project would generate about $246,000 per year in real estate taxes for the county, Hanover officials said.
Devon owns and manages a diverse portfolio of commercial properties in Virginia and North Carolina.
Contact Bob Piazza at (804) 559-8408 or bpiazza@timesdispatch.com
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