Commercial real estate

Development drumbeat grows louder
Put JLL Senior Vice President Brent Miller firmly in the camp that believes new office development in Tampa will be a reality sooner rather than later.

Miller, who heads tenant representation services for JLL, contends that over the next 18 months there will “have to be” new development.

“Either on a speculative basis or by being largely pre-leased, there will have to be new product to meet demand given current trend lines,” Miller says. “There's already a lot of demand now.”

Miller adds that the real driver will be when the office vacancy rate dips below 10% in Tampa's Westshore district. According to some measures, the rate has already reached single digits in Westshore, though some analysts maintain that mark won't be reached until the latter half of 2016.

UTC looking to iPic
No names have been officially attached to the movie theater that Benderson Development Co. officials say is coming to University Town Center, but industry buzz is that iPic Theaters will be opening there.

Benderson officials made the theater announcement last month, during one-year anniversary celebrations for the Mall at University Town Center, the company's joint venture with Michigan-based Taubman Centers Inc.

Mark Chait, Benderson's director of Florida leasing, says the unnamed theater would be built at University Parkway and Interstate 75, on land adjacent to the $315 million mall. It will also anchor a planned entertainment district Benderson plans to construct there.

Neither Chait nor Michelle Soudry, an iPic spokeswoman, returned calls for comment on the theater chain's plans.

If the iPic theater comes to fruition, UTC would join more than a dozen other locations the chain operates in Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Texas, Washington and Wisconsin, according to the company's website.

In Florida, iPic has a theater in Boca Raton, and a North Miami Beach location is expected to open next month, according to the website.

Like CineBistro, scheduled to debut at Westfield Corp.'s Southgate Mall in Sarasota next year, iPic combines plush movie watching with high-end dining, a “chef-driven” menu and adult beverage options.