Promenade 23 Associates sold the Promenade 23 Shopping Center last week. Weingarten Realty assumed ownership of the complex on March 25th. The Central Area shopping center sold for $18.4 million. The sale marks a new phase in the shopping center’s development.
The Promenade 23 Shopping Center, commonly known as “The Promenade”, straddles both sides of South Jackson Street. Anchored by Starbucks, Walgreen’s and Red Apple Grocery, the complex welcomes much activity at 23rd & Jackson. With most of the neighborhood’s retailers, it is the economic hub of the Central Area neighborhood.
After more than 30 years, Promenade 23 Associates agreed it was time to sell their shopping center. In dealing with several stakeholder turnovers, the investment partners realized they had taken Promenade’s development as far as it would. Promenade 23 Associates built The Promenade’s south side in the 1970’s and expanded north in 1996.
Weingarten Realty is a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) based in Houston, Texas. Weingarten is an industry leader in developing and managing neighborhood shopping centers. Weingarten’s property portfolio spans the nation. With the addition of The Promenade, Weingarten now owns five Washington properties between Mukilteo and Puyallup.
George Staggers, CEO of CADA, recently met with a senior vice president of Weingarten. Insightful information was exchanged by both executives regarding the neighborhood and The Promenade. Weingarten’s representative expressed the REIT’s excitement and eagerness in taking The Promenade to its next level of development.
Weingarten will be exploring all options to elevate The Promenade to its highest and best use. Weingarten will review several retailers to recruit and will seek to redevelop The Promenade’s south side. The REIT also looks forward to working with the community during The Promenade’s redevelopment. Staggers did share idea and business suggestions for The Promenade obtained via centraldistrictnews.com.
As Weingarten redevelops The Promenade, should the new owner change the name?
CADA, a non profit community development corporation, works to revitalize the Central Area neighborhood. CADA was an investment partner of Promenade 23 Associates. For more on CADA, www.cada.org.
See also our previous story about Promenade 23: http://www.centraldistrictnews.com/2011/02/23/once-an-ambiti
Does anyone know what their other Puget Sound area properties are?
http://www.weingarten.com/retail/results.aspx?ma=Seattle-Tac
From the looks of things it doesn’t seem like the Promenade is going to turn into the utopia so many people on this site seem to think they can make happen by commenting on CDN. Just sayin.
If George Staggers was involved with the development of Promenade 23, let’s hope the new developers don’t listen to any of his advice on where to go from here.
drove by and saw that the vacant hollywood video space is now going to be an auto zone – – that’s a huge disappointment. really wish we could get some different businesses engaged at that corner.
With so much new housing local to this property ( Welch Towers, and all those new units being built along Jackson St, and down 23rd ), I would think that the most desirable option for an investor, would be to retain this block as a service oriented investment. Increasing traffic to this site could be handled through creation of a single large, or multiple smaller anchore businesses, that we locals would want to support.
In responce to an earlier comment about previous owner lack of selection of the most desirable businesses for this site, I can only wonder what control they had on selection of tenants? If a viable tenant applies to rent a store front, I do not know if they can be turned away just because the site owner feels these tenants would not be providing the most desirable business for the local community.
I do agree that some of the site tenants do not seem to be drawing most of the locals in to shop. Hopefully the new owner will be reassessing the need to bring in anchore businesses that all of us can support, ones that actually provide Customer support and services that are needed. As it is, I no longer shop there, as I find that if I need groceries, I go to Safeway on 23rd, or Capital Hill QFC or Trader Joes, and then plan the rest of my shopping needs around that major trip ( none of these are at the Prominade currently ). This now means that I must drive to these sites, rather than walking to the Prominade. Hopefully the new investors will be able to bring a new set of options to this area, as I seem to currently only find the Starbucks to be a place where I can walk over and run into or meet with my neighbors locally.
I see that Weingarten also owns Rainier Plaza which is as equally uninspiring as Promenade 23. They really need to embrace other models of retail destination developments found all over the nation focused more on the pedestrian experience. You can have the same amount of parking and equally or better performing tenants in a development that makes you want to hang out for a while rather than just stop in. Put the parking in the back or underneath, recruit tenants with experience and commitment to revitalizing a business district (like Columbia City businesses), and please incorporate some pedestrian amenities so it doesn’t feel so dangerous in there. A plaza, some benches, maybe some art.
you expect that from out of state owners? Texans?
I can’t envision a good outcome here. Look at the Autozone that they’ve placed there already.
The bottom line will drive the development here. I’d love to be proven wrong….
But I suspect we’ll more likely get Dollar Store, Taco Bell, and maybe a competing Auto Chain store.
Will be interesting – dump the name. Promenade ain’t cuttin it.
Soo JP Resident
Texas developers are much nicer than the vagrants crapping in public at the Goodwill site,
oh wait, there was a great plan once for that site before someone ruined those plans and continues to try and ruin the neighborhood with their paternalistic control freak rants and actions. Maybe DESC would like to place their inmates at the Promanade instead of needed development going there, wouldn’t you support that?
@ Patty’s comment… CADA was a limited partner in the Promenade 23 Associates. As such, CADA did not have management control over Promenade. However, CADA played a signficant role in recruiting Starbucks, City of Seattle DON and Chase Bank @ Welch Plaza. CADA had no role in recruiting more recent tenants such as the cosmetology school or Auto Zone.
I will never understand why people would rather see vacant store fronts than a business that might actually benefit the neighbors and make their lives easier. No, it’s not the greatest use of space and it’s not a high-end grocery store, but it’s something useful and practical AND it’s one less vacant storefront.
I also don’t understand why people are so critical of the Promenade 23 development and are calling for a complete redesign/renovation of it in this economic climate. Do they really think there is even a possibility of this happening? We have VACANT LOTS and empty storefronts at 23rd & Union, and people think we should uproot existing businesses at 23rd & Jackson to revamp the whole place?
I agree it’s ugly and not what our neighborhood would like in a long term planning sense, but it’s SOMETHING, which is better than what we have going on in lots of other areas of our community, and the city as a whole. I’ll take Auto Zone – fine with me. Next time I need a quart of oil I won’t have to drive down Rainier.