Downtown News

Owners of Dallas' Reunion Tower plan to develop long-vacant land nearby

Reunion Arena

RadicalBender at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0

More than 15 years after Reunion Arena in downtown Dallas closed, the owners of the surrounding property are plotting a massive development on the land.

Hunt Realty Investments, which owns Reunion Tower and more than 20 acres surrounding it, tells the DMN in a subscription-only story that it's planning to build a dozen new high-rises, with apartments, offices, retail, a convention hotel with 600 to 1,000 rooms, and a park.

Phase one will comprise hotel, retail, dining, and entertainment. The project will include up to 3,000 apartments, some of which they say will be set aside as "affordable" workforce housing for nurses, firemen, and such.

They also have aspirations to redevelop Union Station, a train stop for DART, the TRE, and Amtrak which opened in 1916.

Reunion Arena was razed in 2009. Hunt has owned the property since the '70s and let it sit vacant all that time, despite offers from others willing to develop it.

"I cannot tell you how many inquiries we have received to buy 2 acres or buy this or that," Hunt Investment Holdings CEO Chris Kleinert says to the DMN. “We’ve heard more than once, you guys haven’t done anything down there in decades. ... We think the timing is right with what’s happening at the convention center."

They say they've brought the city millions, with the Reunion development contributing $350 million in taxes to local governments, and predicting millions more over the next 20 years.

"Hunt has owned that land for 50 years," says Hunt Realty Investments president Colin Fitzgibbons. "They waited patiently for something to come around to accelerate redevelopment, and here comes the convention center."

The project would join other convention-center-profiteering developments in the area such as the former Dallas Morning News building being redeveloped by Ray Washburne.

Construction on the new convention center is supposed to start next year and be complete by 2028. A deck park connected to the convention center and extending over I-30 is scheduled to open by 2030.

Other Hunt Realty projects include the NorthEnd project on Field Street north of Woodall Rodgers Freeway consisting of an office campus for Goldman Sachs, high-rise residences, a hotel, and retail; and the Fields development in Frisco with 10,000 homes and apartments, commercial districts, and the Universal theme park, being built around the PGA headquarters and golf resort.

downtown openings

Million-dollar homes

Multi-million-dollar gated home community The Preserve rises in Frisco

Preserve

A palace on the prairie of The Preserve in Frisco

Construction has begun on a multi-million-dollar custom home community in Frisco. Called The Preserve, it's situated among PGA Frisco’s championship golf courses and near the Omni PGA Frisco Resort, with multiple phases that will roll out over the next few years.

The Preserve is part of Fields, a 2,500-acre development in North Frisco off the Dallas North Tollway. Fields is co-developed and owned in partnership with The Karahan Companies, Hunt Realty Investments alongside investors Chief Partners and Cross Tie Capital.

The development will feature retail, dining, entertainment, hotels, corporate offices, native Texas plants, flowers, trees, and 250 acres of park space. It's designed by the same team responsible for Plano’s Legacy West, led by Fehmi Karahan.

Phase 1 of The Preserve will feature 233 homes crafted by 10 North Texas luxury homebuilders: Alford Homes, Coats Homes, and Starside Builders have all begun home construction. The other seven are The Preserve Bella Custom Homes, Endurance Homes, Faulkner Perrin Custom Homes, Hawkins-Welwood Homes, Shaddock Custom Builders & Developers, Sharif & Munir Custom Homes, and Ventura Custom Homes, for whom construction will start soon.

The Preserve Frisco The Preserve in Frisco, soon to be covered with homes.The Preserve

Lot sizes range from 6,800 square feet to more than an acre. Home design options will incorporate high ceilings, open floor plans, glass walls, and seamless transitions between indoor and outdoor such as patios, infinity pools, and landscaped exteriors.

The surrounding area will have more than 2,000 new trees plus views delivered via design elements such as floor-to-ceiling windows and expansive outdoor living areas.

Many of the homes will address sustainability, health, and wellness with green architecture, energy efficiency, water conservation, and recycled building materials.

It will combine the privacy of a gated community with resort-style living, featuring amenities such as the PGA golf courses, 20+ miles of hike and bike trails, and the exclusive Brookside Club with an expansive swimming pool, state-of-the-art fitness center, tennis and pickleball courts and a playground.

Prices will start at $3,500,000.

Hunt Realty SVP Todd Watson calls it one of the most anticipated mixed-use projects in the area -- æa perfect location for discerning buyers seeking their forever home or a secondary residence" — although he's involved with the project so he's probably biased.

“As part of the Fields development, with prominent neighbors like PGA of America and the Omni PGA Frisco Resort, we know The Preserve will be one of the most sought-after addresses in North Texas," Watson says.

According to the Frisco Economic Development Corporation, Frisco’s population has increased by 500 percent in two decades and was recently recognized as the fastest growing city in Texas and third across the U.S.

home-for-sale