The North Carolina Department of Transportation has floated allowing parts of the planned I-77 interstate expansion to be constructed underground, after dismissing the idea as too expensive just a month prior, according to a Charlotte Observer report. 

NCDOT indicated that underground expansion of the highway was back on the table during a city of Charlotte transportation committee meeting Thursday and invited developers to get creative about overall plans for how to make the expansion happen.

The transportation department had initially rejected the idea of underground tunnels in early February, Axios reported. The $3.2B expansion project would add two lanes, both north and south, on a section of I-77 spanning 11 miles. 

NCDOT announced last week it would initiate a three-month delay on its request for proposals for the expansion. 

There has been growing pushback to the project from nearby residents, while Charlotte’s business community has signaled that abandoning the planned infrastructure investment would stifle local development.

The proposed design for the expansion is only 10% to 15% complete. Final design isn’t expected to be completed until the end of 2027, according to an NCDOT press release.

Current plans call for the interstate to be widened through the southern portion of the city and elevated above uptown, then returning downward to connect with existing toll lanes already open from north of uptown to Iredell County. 

The project was first proposed by the Charlotte Regional Transportation Planning Organization in 2014 and placed on a long-range planning document. 

A public-private funding plan was approved in 2024. It includes $600M of state funding, with the remainder to be funded privately and recovered via commuters’ tolls, the CBJ reported.

Last week, the Black Political Caucus of Charlotte-Mecklenburg, a community advocacy organization, announced it was seeking a temporary restraining order to pause the project. 

Opponents of the plan have criticized the above-ground design favored by NCDOT, saying it would bring increased air and noise pollution to primarily minority neighborhoods and displace residents. For some Charlotte residents, the expansion harkens back to earlier injury done to their neighborhoods. 

Robert McCutcheon, president and CEO of the Charlotte Regional Business Alliance, acknowledged that past highway projects have disproportionately impacted Black neighborhoods in Charlotte in a Feb. 24 op-ed in The Charlotte Observer. However, McCutcheon argued that abandoning the project would forfeit state investment in the city’s roads while hurting small businesses, worsening congestion and reducing workforce access. 

“Walking away does not eliminate growth pressures. It risks sending investment elsewhere,” McCutcheon stated in the op-ed.

The Charlotte Regional Transportation Planning Organization, made up of regional governments, ultimately must vote on whatever proposal NCDOT puts forward.

Craig Idlebrook contributed to this story.

After a multistate search, an emerging automotive manufacturer has landed on Charlotte for its corporate home. 

A 1968 Scout truck

Scout Motors announced Wednesday it has selected Charlotte for its new headquarters.

Scout will invest $206M in the 300K SF facility, which will serve as a center for the company’s executive leadership, research and development, finance, IT, sales and marketing teams. 

The headquarters will reportedly bring approximately 1,200 jobs to the region, with initial staffing and office development beginning in 2026. Scout will also relocate more than 350 employees based in Northern Virginia to temporary offices in Charlotte as the new HQ is being built, according to the city of Charlotte.

The new center of operations will be at the Commonwealth development in the Plaza Midwood neighborhood of Mecklenburg County. Nuveen Real Estate and Crosland Southeast developed the 12-acre property, Charlotte Business Journal reports. 

Scout Motors CEO Scott Keogh said in a statement that the car manufacturer selected Charlotte due to its talent pool and connection to leading universities. 

The state of North Carolina will provide Scout Motors a job development investment grant worth up to $46.5M if the company reaches certain hiring and investment goals, The Charlotte Observer reports.

Scout Motors, an American subsidiary of Volkswagen, is a revitalization of the Scout light-truck brand that was originally produced by International Harvester in 1961. The Scout was known as the first utility offroad truck that could double as a family vehicle. In 2022, Scout Motors formed to bring all-electric Scout trucks and SUVs to market.

The site for the new headquarters sits approximately one hour north of Scout Motors’ manufacturing center, which is under construction off Interstate 77 in the Columbia suburb of Blythewood, South Carolina. That facility is scheduled to open in 2027 for the production of Scout Traveler SUVs and Scout Terra trucks. 

The $2B Blythewood facility will cover between 1,100 and 1,600 acres, with the main plant slated to be 1.3M SF. 

In 2023, the state of South Carolina agreed to chip in $1.3B to help with the cost of the factory’s construction and infrastructure upgrades. Scout must meet hiring goals and invest a minimum of $400M in the facility during an eight-year period, according to a report by The Nerve, the reporting arm of The South Carolina Policy Council. 

The first phase grand opening of Aggie Square is slated for May 2. A development by Wexford Science + Technology in partnership with The University of California, Davis and the city of Sacramento, Aggie Square is a mixed-use development on the UC Davis Health Campus in Sacramento. The first phase will consist of approximately 808,000 square feet of Class A life sciences research labs, technology and office space, plus housing and retail space

“Once the entire Aggie Square project is up and running, it will support 3,200 jobs annually and about $500 million in annual regional economic impact in the Sacramento region,” said UC Davis Chancellor Gary S. May, citing analyses from Economic and Planning Systems Inc.

Wexford hired a Cushman & Wakefield leasing team including local office/technology brokers Ron Thomas, Bruce Hohenhaus, and Kris Kalmbach together with Marc Pope and Brett Ward of the firm’s National Life Sciences Practice Group in Northern and Southern California.

Arctaris Impact Investors, LLC and Housing Diversity Corporation (HDC) announced the opening of Liv DTLA, an eight-story, 227-unit affordable housing development designed to address Los Angeles’ severe housing shortage. The project was co-sponsored and developed by HDC, while Arctaris Impact provided critical project funding. 

The privately funded, all-studio housing project, located in an Opportunity Zone at 1411 S. Flower St., is positioned near the Los Angeles Convention Center and Pico Metro Station on the A and E Lines. Through a five-year master lease with the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, the building will provide permanent supportive housing with wraparound services by The People Concern. Reportedly it is the county’s largest master-leased housing development.

“The innovative master lease structure with LA County allows developers to house low-income families without relying on federal subsidies, while also completing the project more efficiently than other affordable housing options,” said Nihar Sait, managing director and head of real estate at Arctaris.

March 20, 2025: Register to attend the 9^th annual Connect Orange County coming up on Thursday, March 20^th, and join the region’s most active investors, owners, developers, dealmakers, managers, brokers, lenders, and more at the Hyatt Regency Irvine. Learn more, get involved, and register at: www.ConnectOC2025.com  

It used to take 45 minutes for citizens of Celina to get to the nearest Dallas hospital. That will change next month. Celina’s first hospital is expected to open before the end of March. Once open, the hospital will immediately begin providing emergency and critical care services.

Methodist Celina Medical Center is a 46-acre, $237 million project located at the corner of Dallas Parkway and FM 428. It is roughly three miles from Celina’s downtown square.

The medical center will have 200,000 square feet under roof. In addition, there will be a 40,000-square-foot medical office building with spaces from 2,642 to 7,288 square feet.

Offerings include 30 medical-surgical beds, eight intensive care unit beds, two procedure rooms, one catheterization lab and three operating rooms equipped with a da Vinci surgical robot. The hospital will have 51 beds and can expand to over 100. The hospital will have 200 employees.

Duracell, the well-known battery maker, is building a new $56 million research and development headquarters in Atlanta. The plant, which will require 110 workers, will open in summer 2026 and be part of Science Square Labs. The first phase of Science Square opened last year. Georgia Tech partnered with commercial real estate firm Trammell Crow Co. on the project. When complete, Science Square will span 18 acres and include 1.8 million square feet of lab and office space, apartments and retail space. 

Duracell manufactures alkaline, lithium coin and hearing aid batteries. The company is a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. 

Duracell has had a presence in Georgia since 1980. It operates a manufacturing facility in LaGrange with 400 workers and a distribution plant in Fairburn that employs 275.

Duracell was represented by Chad Koenig and Katelyn Fabian with Partners Real Estate.

Activate, an interactive gaming facility, has selected Fox River Commons in Naperville for the site of its second location in the greater Chicago area.

In partnership with Sounds Fun Entertainment, Activate currently operates more than 40 sites in the United States and Canada and signed a lease with Continental Realty Corporation (CRC) for nearly 12,000 square feet of space. Kristin Perry, Leasing Manager for Continental Realty Corporation and Brooke Spinell of Mid-America Real Estate represented the landlord and Courtney Waldon of Braden Real Estate represented the tenant in this transaction.

The group intends to open within the neighborhood shopping center located at 704 Illinois Route 59 this spring. Activate opened its first Chicago area site in 2023 and plans to open its third Illinois facility in the River North area next year. Activate consists of separate game rooms with experiential elements, including cutting-edge technology, lasers, and obstacles.

The concept joins the pickleball facility The Picklr at the 241,000-square-foot shopping center that CRC acquired in 2022. The property is now approximately 81 percent leased.

Calvin Klein plans to open a flagship store at SHVO’s 530 Broadway in SoHo, parent company PVH Corp. said on its third-quarter earnings call. PVH CEO Stefan Larsson on the call called SoHo “one of the best brand-building and foot traffic locations in the world.” The new store is expected to open by the end of 2025.

The 7,294-square-foot retail store is part of Calvin Klein’s plan to open flagship locations worldwide, highlighting the ongoing return of brick-and-mortar retail. Data from research firm Forrester suggest that 72% of total U.S. retail sales will occur in brick-and-mortar stores into 2028.

530 Broadway comprises what were originally three adjacent structures on the corner of Broadway and Spring Street. SHVO acquired the early-20th century complex in 2020 and spearheaded its mixed-use redevelopment, bringing in architecture firm Snarkitecture to complete its first office project.

EoS Fitness is expanding into greater Atlanta. With plans to open over 50 locations throughout Georgia over the next ten years, EoS is set to open its first several gyms by 2027.

EoS has over 175 locations open or on the way in Arizona, California, Florida, Nevada, Texas and Utah. Georgia is part of the company’s broader strategy to surpass 250 gyms nationwide by 2030, reinforcing its commitment to providing communities with a premium fitness option featuring a variety of exceptional amenities at an accessible price point.

Each new location represents a $10 million investment and brings 40-60 jobs. The company plans to open more than 30 gyms in 2025.

EoS Fitness locations in the greater Atlanta area will average between 40,000 and 50,000 square feet.