The center will have two major anchors, including Target; 11 junior anchors; restaurants and other retailers. Leases are being negotiated with Chili's, Fifth Third Bank, Panda Express, Marshall's, Staples, Subway and others, says Gene Detchemendy, partner with Primestor and director of leasing. About 90% of the center is currently either leased or in lease negotiations, Detchemendy says. The asking lease rate is in the "$36 range" triple net. Marshfield Plaza is expected to open in fall 2008.

The plaza will be Primestor's first development in Chicago. The majority of the company's projects are in southern California. Primestor chose to expand to the Chicago area because of a "similar trend of older urban core, demographics, opportunity to revitalize old blighted and obsolete industrial-use (buildings) and vacant land," Salcido says. The location, at the off-ramp of 199th Street for Interstate 57, had a 500,000-sf canning plant, Libby Food, on the site. The property has "strong visibility and frontage on the interstate, relatively low competition, no new developments and a desire by the community to have new retail," he says.

Primestor has been working on the development for a long time, with the project stalled after the Chicago City Council approved an ordinance that would mandate a certain minimum-wage for employees of big-box retailers. "This project was the first causality of the big box ordinance in July 2006," Salcido tells GlobeSt.com. "When the big box ordinance passed, Target put their plans on hold and the project came to a standstill." After Mayor Richard Daley vetoed the ordinance in September 2006, Target moved forward with its plans, which allowed Primestor to move ahead with the development, he says.

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