Seventh Street Development has purchased a 22.5-acre parcel on the western side of the 71 Corona Expressway at Mission Boulevard in Pomona, with plans to develop the property as the final phase of the two million square-foot Mission 71 Business Park, announced Principal Craig Furniss.
The $40 million final phase called “Mission 71 West” will complete the private development of the former General Dynamics Naval Industrial Reserve Ordinance Plant, which was shuttered in 1994. Mission 71 West will total approximately 500,000 square feet and will be comprised of four industrial buildings ranging in size from 65,000 to more than 200,000 square feet.
“These former defense contractor facilities have provided excellent opportunities for commercial redevelopment and we are bringing economic life back to Pomona; however, it has taken some persistence,” said Furniss. Seventh Street has assembled its development parcels in three separate land purchases from three different owners, including the Federal Government. “About 10 years ago, we successfully redeveloped the 105-acre Northrop Grumman facility in Hawthorne which presented some similar challenges, but there we only dealt with one seller,” continued Furniss.
According to a third-party Fiscal Revenue & Employment Study, when fully occupied, Mission 71 will create more than 1,750 permanent jobs and will generate more than $2.2 million in annual revenue for the City of Pomona, County of Los Angeles and local schools.
“We expect to return this land to productive use like it was 1952 when the first of the more than 1,000,000 square feet of buildings were built by General Dynamics,” said Furniss. “The plant bristled with activity until it closed in the early 1990’s. Most of the buildings have been demolished and the land has sat largely vacant until its recent redevelopment as the Mission-71 Business Park.”
The first two successful Phases of the Mission 71 Business Park are complete and feature a renovated 750,000-square-foot former General Dynamics building and 11 newly constructed buildings ranging in size from 16,000 to 42,000 square feet. These new buildings are all occupied by owners-users that include food and industrial product manufacturers as well as a variety of importers and distributors.
Earlier this year Seventh Street broke ground on the first of four buildings in its Phase III, a 245,000-square-foot corporate headquarters and manufacturing building, which has been pre-sold to the Kittrich Corporation. A major manufacturer of products for the home, Kittrich is relocating its corporate offices and approximately 220 jobs from La Mirada. Construction is expected to begin on the final three buildings of Phase III by year-end. Buildings of 42,000, 51,000 and 114,000 square feet will be located along 1,500 lineal feet of freeway frontage, on the eastern side of the 71 Corona Expressway. Construction on newly acquired property (the 500,000-square-foot Mission West (Phase IV) is planned to follow in 2014.