Industry News

The Veterans Affairs Medical Center is planning to break ground in late 2003 on the first two buildings of its planned $160-million City of Medicine campus in Durham. Totalling 96,000 sf of office and retail space, the two facilities will be developed by LCOR of Berwyn, Pa. The City of Medicine is a mixed-use project comprised of ten new medical research, office, retail, hotel, and apartment buildings. Thirty-five percent of the facilities will be leased to federal government-related tenants. Some VA hospital functions may be relocated to the new development.

Ford Motor Co. will begin construction in June 2003 on a new parts distribution facility in McDonough, Ga. The 231,000-sf facility will replace a 627,000-sf McDonough building; Ford is replacing approximately ten larger parts facilities nationwide with a network of 21 regional facilities serving smaller geographic areas. Construction firm ARCO Design/Build has been selected as general contractor for the distribution warehouse to be sited on 23 acres in the Greenwood Industrial Park. Occupancy is slated for March 2004.

Kaiser Permanente is opening a new 120,000-sf medical office building in Daly City, Calif. The facility, owned by King Asset Management of Palo Alto, will undergo a $31-million renovation prior to the relocation of 72 healthcare providers from Kaiser’s El Camino Real campus in San Francisco. The new facility is slated to open in November 2003 and will house women’s health services, pediatrics, internal medicine, optical services including ophthalmology, a laboratory, and a pharmacy.

British Airways has awarded EMCOR Group a three-year contract valued at $40 million annually to be the airline's single-source provider of facilities management services for the majority of British Airway's UK property portfolio. The new agreement continues an 11-year relationship with British Airways that was the airline's first outsourcing of facilities management in the UK.  

Toyodabo Manufacturing Kentucky LLC is planning to construct a $9.8 million manufacturing facility in Lebanon, Ky. The facility will manufacture molded headliners for the automobile industry and is expected to begin production in 2004. The company is a division of Kariya, Japan-based Toyoda Boshoku Corp. Toyadabo's primary customer is Toyota Motor Corp.