"This is really a new prototype project for higher education in America," Joseph Pitchford, vice president of development at Concord Eastridge, tells GlobeSt.com. "It's a mixed-use project with a split between pure academic facilities and private-sector facilities that help support those academic uses."

With groundbreaking eyed for 2006, ASU and the developer will spend the next 18 months hashing out the scope and financial goals for the project. Concord Eastridge was one of three bidders vying for the job. Some 16 firms initially submitted proposals.

The university acquired the site at the southeast corner of University Drive and Mill Avenue in 1983. It will be built out as a mid-rise urban development with six-story configurations along with subterranean and above-ground parking. Pitchford estimates two million sf will rise at the corner in a fairly equal split of private-sector and academic uses. The corner will house a headquarters building for the WP Carey School of Business as well as a new structures for the Herberger College of Fine Arts and College of Architecture and Environmental Design. It also will hold a hotel and conference center, grocery store, retail shops and multifamily units.