After rapid growth, the Dallas-Fort Worth industrial market cools

After explosive growth in recent years, the Dallas-Fort Worth industrial market is slowing. But the domestic market remains strong long-term, real estate officials say.

Both at the national landscape level and here, we were seeing those net absorption numbers certainly go down and down on a comparative basis, said Reid Goetz, senior vice president of Hillwood. It’s really normalizing.

During the pandemic, Goetz said, companies rushed to find space as consumers and businesses began shopping online. That question has faded, he said.

If absorption rate trends continue for the rest of the year, normalize well, relatively historically speaking, he said.

While leasing and construction have slowed in Dallas-Fort Worth, that doesn’t mean there isn’t still an opportunity, Goetz said.

We were still a top-three, top-four, top-five market, depending on the numbers you look at from a construction standpoint, he said. There are still many opportunities as companies consider national distribution centers and regional manufacturing for them to come to the DFW area.

The area’s long-term fundamentals remain strong, Goetz said.

That is why we decided to implement our speculative industrial building program that we announced a few weeks ago and why we are designing over three and a half million square feet within the Alliance. The fundamentals here are very strong, he said.

Among these bases is population growth. Fort Worth is now the 12th largest city in the country, according to new census numbers, and is likely to pass Austin within the next year.

Population growth and continued job growth in the area will help absorb vacant stock and support future developments over the next cycle, according to a first-quarter report on the local industrial market from property broker Transwestern Real Estate.

Hillwood recently announced plans for Alliance Westport 14, a 766,994-square-foot, Class A speculative industrial building.

In addition to Alliance Westport 14, Hillwood announced it was designing an additional 3.5 million square feet of next-generation industrial facilities across the 27,000-acre AllianceTexas development.

We see a significant opportunity in this current economic cycle to continue to invest in our industrial platform, particularly in the size range that Alliance Westport 14 offers, said Goetz. Despite a broader market slowdown in leasing and development, AllianceTexas continues to see tremendous demand from best-in-class logistics companies and manufacturers, in part due to the multimodal supply chain transportation options offered by the convenience base logistics here.

Demand is coming both from companies that are already here and looking to expand, and from companies from outside the area looking to operate here, he said.

We’ve looked at consumer products, we’ve looked at retailers, we’ve looked at manufacturers, he said. Shifting manufacturing capacity is a very real topic and a real story, whether it’s from overseas to here in the US, or a shift from other parts of the country. This is a very real trend that we were seeing here at the Alliance.

DFW Airport reopens runway in time for summer travel

Dallas Fort Worth International Airport has reopened its widest runway after a nine-month closure for planned rehabilitation. The runway, one of seven at DFW, returned to service on May 24 in a shortened configuration of 9,275 feet to enable use of the surface during the busy summer travel season.
The innovative approach to phased construction and a partial reopening allows crews to simultaneously complete the remaining work while returning to service what is normally one of the busiest runways for aircraft to use during the peak season. travel, said Mohamed Charkas, executive vice president. of infrastructure and development in DFW.
The full track is expected to open at the end of this year. The rehabilitation project includes a complete reconstruction of the runway with a layer of high-density asphalt, as well as new and improved drainage infrastructure, electrical and lighting infrastructure, signage and icing infrastructure. The new 2.7 million square feet of rink area is equivalent to 570 NBA basketball courts, according to DFW.
Earlier this year, DFW was awarded a $45 million Airport Infrastructure Grant under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Aviation Administration to help fund the runway project.
This is the third runway to undergo a complete rehabilitation at DFW in the past seven years and is part of the airports’ ongoing capital improvement program that is set to invest more than $9 billion in facility expansions and improvements. including the complete reconstruction of Terminal C and the construction of a new Terminal F, over the next five years.

DFW will need the runway as it anticipates about 25 million passengers will travel through the airport between May and July, a 10% increase from the same period last year.

Fuzzys Taco Shop on the rise

Fuzzys Taco Shop, which opened its first quick-serve restaurant location near TCU to feed hungry horned frogs, is continuing to expand.

The brand, now based in Irving, said it has signed two multi-unit development deals to bring 40 new restaurants over the next eight years in Arizona and Texas.

Fuzzys has grown from a single neighborhood taco shop with a cool vibe in Fort Worth, Texas, to an emerging, nationally franchised concept with an outstanding bar program and a Baja-inspired menu that our guests love. have desired, said Paul Damico, president. , in a news release.

Going to the dogs

It’s rough or should be rough there.

Fort Worth is ranked no. 17 in the recent list of cities where dogs have bitten a postal worker.

Incidents involving dog attacks on Postal Service employees increased to more than 5,800 cases last year, according to the US Postal Service. As part of the 2024 National Dog Bite Awareness Week Campaign, the organization released a ranking of cities and states where dogs attack postal workers.

Fort Worth saw 23 such attacks in 2023 and was ranked No. 17. That was well below Houston, which came in at No. 2 with 56 attacks and No. 7 Dallas, with 36 attacks. Texas, with 411 total attacks on postal carriers, did not fare well, ranking first. 2 after 727 dog bites in California.

The National Dog Bite Awareness Campaign runs from June 2nd to June 9th. This year’s theme is Don’t let your dog bite the hand that serves you.

So you have something for the Bob on Business column? Email Bob Francis at bob.francis@fortworthreport.org.

Bob Francis is business editor for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at bob.francis@fortworthreport.org. At The Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently by our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.

This article originally appeared in the Fort Worth Report and is reprinted here under a Creative Commons license.