6 key projects west of SR 347

There is a long list of active and planned residential and commercial projects on Maricopa’s west side. Here are six that look to change life in the growing city — as soon as year’s end.

TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS

The Estrella Gin Business Park, Maricopa’s first foray into a true business park, has one very important role — make it easier for people to do business.

Not only will local businesses have a way to get into professional office space, a difficult proposition in a city where it is rarely available, but Valley entities will find it easier to set up an outpost in town.

Construction should begin this month on 32 acres at West Edison and North Loma roads, according to Shane Cook, the commercial leasing agent for MHG Group. Zoned light industrial with flexibility for a variety of uses — retail, office, manufacturing, light
industrial or warehouse — the park is expected to create 700 new jobs with an annual payroll of nearly $42 million.

The smaller, flexible, commercial spaces are exactly what local businesspeople need, according to Mayor Christian Price.

“Some of the tenants are going to be small and micro businesses that have to come out of their garages,” he said. “Rather than pay for some super-expensive site on (State Route) 347, they can have a more affordable location where they can take their business to the next level.”

The initial 6,000-square-foot office building has been fully leased by the City of Maricopa for the Maricopa Economic Development Agency, the Maricopa Chamber of Commerce and for city meetings and activities that cannot be accommodated elsewhere. MEDA should be in its space later this year with the rest of the 300,000-square-foot park on track for an early 2022 opening, Cook said.

He added he is already getting inquiries from small businesses in the Valley that see
Maricopa as a potential expansion market.

A HOSPITAL, FINALLY

Residents have clamored for a real hospital for many years. Later this year, the city’s decade-long efforts to attract one will finally pay off with the scheduled opening of Exceptional Healthcare’s community hospital.

With the facility rising quickly at the southwest end of the SR 347 overpass, the Texas-based company expects to complete the long-awaited, $20 million facility by year’s end. It will include a 24-hour emergency department, eliminating the need for trauma patients to be transported to ERs in Chandler or Casa Grande.

When it opens, the single-story building will have 10 private rooms, 10 emergency department rooms, a medical lab and a digital imaging suite offering CT scans,
X-rays, mobile MRIs and ultrasound. Outpatient and inpatient hospital beds
will accommodate acute admissions and overnight observation of patients.

Air ambulances will be able to land on site to speed transfer of patients needing a higher level of care to regional hospitals. The hospital expects to employ 60-100 people.

2,000 HOMES ON THE FARM

The development of Hogenes Dairy is the largest residential housing project planned west of SR 347.

The former Maricopa Meadows 2 project, newly rechristened as Hogenes Farms, will have an initial phase of 812 single-family homes with future phases increasing the total to as many as 2,000. The development could ultimately add more than 5,000 residents on the west side of town.

No start date has been provided by Matrix Equities of Scottsdale, which also developed the 1,600-plus homes in Maricopa Meadows just east of the dairy farm.

Price said the project, while stirring some debate about growth, will provide solutions to some vexing infrastructure problems.

“We all agree there are traffic challenges in the city,” Price said. “This development will force the construction of the overpass on Green Road over the railroad tracks, which will be an anchor of traffic solutions for the future that are not on 347. It will add tax dollars from the new homes that are built and force new traffic relievers to come into play, and that’s a big deal.”

Matrix will provide the right of way dedication and construction of Green Road, preliminary design of an overpass across the tracks at Green Road and limit the number of homes that can be built until the overpass is completed, according to City Manager Rick Horst.

SPROUTS IS SPROUTING

Sonoran Creek Marketplace may be the city’s most anticipated commercial development for one reason — Sprouts Farmers Market.

The popular, high-end grocery is one of nearly a dozen businesses coming to the shopping plaza, which will begin to open later this year at the southwest corner of Edison Avenue and John Wayne Parkway. The store will anchor 82,000 square feet of retail space on 19 acres.

Shoppers might be feeling fresh produce in their hands at Sprouts this fall as construction could be done by the end of September, according to Andrew Call, vice president of development management for the Southwest region of developer Thompson Thrift.

Horst said the development will help drive the local economy, creating 282 new jobs with $10.4 million in annual wages and an economic impact of more than $25.6 million.

Other stores signed up for Sonoran Creek include MOD Pizza, Jimmy John’s, State Farm, Filiberto’s Mexican Food and Neon Barre Fitness Studio.

Up to four more tenants will be added at the shopping center, according to Call, who said research indicates the project will play a significant role in the city’s economic development efforts.

“It will spur new services and restaurants that are desperately needed, as well as more new retailers,” he said. “It will definitely spur some additional development in the city, and
especially in and around that area.”

STALLED ON THE TRACK

APEX Motor Club completed its 2.27-mile track more than two years ago at the 280-acre site on SR 238, six miles west of town. But aside from the track and a car-storage building about to be completed, the project has pretty much hit the brakes. But there is hope for a restart.

“We’ve been subsisting for the last two years with the promise of water,” said Jason Plotke, general partner of the private club. “Nothing is going to happen on our end until we have water.”

Plotke’s concern underscores an issue that accompanies nearly every project west of SR 347 — where is the water going to come from to support development? APEX is
hoping the answer is a newly approved pipeline that would carry water from Global Water’s Southwest Plant at Rancho Mirage west and then north, perhaps
up Ralston Road and across SR 238.

When completed, the members-only facility will feature 4.2 miles of track with
a 3,400-foot straightaway. The club offers private garages and 1,250-square-foot
“car condos” with mezzanines. Still in Phase 1 of development, the club has sold all 48 car condos. There will be nearly 180 garages total when fully built out.

Membership levels range from a $50,000 initiation fee and $5,000 annual dues to $175,000 initiation and $22,500 annually. APEX has sold more than 200 memberships
and will cap membership at 425, Plotke said.

Price sees the facility as a huge driver for tourism.

“I think APEX, once the water pipeline is done, will be a whole new ball game,” he said. “It will be something we’ve never seen before as part of the adventure corridor.”

COUNTY SERVICES, CLOSE TO HOME

Maricopans have more convenient access to Pinal County services with the recent opening of an $11 million auxiliary office complex. Two buildings with a total of about 42,000 square feet are now open at 19955 N. Wilson Ave.

County business that may have required a 43-mile drive to the county seat in Florence can now be conducted at Building 100, which houses offices for the assessor, treasurer, recorder, development services and office space for county Supervisor Jeff McClure, who
represents Maricopa and District 4.

Building 200 is home to the Pinal County Justice Court, Clerk of the Superior Court, Adult and Juvenile Probation services, and a Pinal County Sheriff’s Office substation with holding cells.

The Maricopa Police Department will eventually move to the west side when a new headquarters is built down the street from the county complex in 2023.