WEST BOUNTIFUL -- A $12 million office-hotel-restaurant complex nearing completion on a long vacant parcel in this small city could be an indicator of things to come as the commute between Davis County and Salt Lake City prompts executives to consider locating their offices in Davis.
Although the three-story office building at the Clearwater Center, 801 N. 500 West (U.S. 89), was only completed on March 1, two thirds of its 45,000 square feet already is leased. That tells commercial builder Tom C. Mabey that his analysis of demand for Class A office space in south Davis County was correct."Congestion is getting worse. There's been a significant increase in traffic just in the last two years," said Mabey, president of Sahara, a commercial design and building firm.
Mabey said he believes this situation will drive increasing numbers of executives to relocate their offices closer to where they, their employees and their clients live. For many, that means south Davis County.
The fact that the limited amount of high-grade office space in the area never stays vacant for long is another indication that there is demand, he said.
Two of the new office building's tenants are relocating from the Salt Lake area, and several of the executives who will be working in the building live in Davis County, said Mabey.
Chris Udy, general agent for Guardian, a financial services company, is moving his office to the Clearwater Center from I-80 and State Street in South Salt Lake. Although he will have a shorter commute from his Weber County home, that wasn't the main reason he decided on the move, he said.
"We thought about it carefully and concluded that being here would make it easier for our Salt Lake and Ogden clients and for our employees to get to us with less congestion. It's free parking, and you're right on the freeway," Udy said. "I drove to downtown Salt Lake City in 10 minutes the other day and then it took me 30 minutes to get from the parking lot to where I was going."
The Clearwater Center also includes an 86-room Country Inn and Suites Hotel, due to be completed in three to four months.
The third element of the complex will be an upscale, 6,000-square-foot restaurant, something like a Tuscany's, that Mabey hopes will be open in six months. An operator for the restaurant has not been identified. The restaurant will provide food service to the hotel's guests and its conference rooms, which will occupy 2,200 square feet.
For West Bountiful, the Clearwater Center means an attractive new gateway and tax revenue, said Mayor Jim Child.
"The quality is just first class, so we're really excited about it," Child said.
And to those looking for land for commercial developments like the Clearwater Center, Child would like to say come on up. "We've got some other parcels along U.S. 89 and I-15," he said.
Ed Johnson of Colliers Commerce CRG, the leasing agent for the Clearwater Center, said that although its prices of $19 to $19.50 per square foot are comparable with those for similar quality space in downtown Salt Lake, the project offers something downtown lacks: plenty of free parking. Johnson said that's equivalent to a $1 to $2 per square foot discount.