The first phase of Wilmington Trade Center, a master planned industrial park on U.S. 421, recently wrapped up, while work on the next phase is now underway.

Officials with project developer Edgewater Ventures and local leaders marked the progress with a groundbreaking event Thursday. The park’s 100,080-square-foot Building 3 was completed in the past few weeks, and leases for the building are under negotiation, said Chris Norvell, a principal with Edgewater Ventures.

Building 3 is the final piece in the project’s first phase, which also includes Buildings 1 and 2, with just over 157,500 square feet each. 

The second phase of the industrial park kicked off in March when crews began clearing and grading around 125 acres at the back of the property for future development. Eventually, the site being cleared could hold industrial park Buildings 4 through 8 and Buildings 11 through 13, according to Mike Massardo, a principal with Edgewater Ventures.

The 157,500-square-foot Building 4, the first in the second phase to get off the ground, is in the final stages of construction permitting, said Brian Beaver, director of construction with Edgewater Ventures. The second phase also includes the installation of infrastructure, including water, sewer, gas and electric to serve the future development sites.

Once Building 3 is leased to about 50% occupancy, they plan to break ground on Building 4, Norvell said. Construction of the building should take about 10 months, according to Beaver. Edgewater Ventures has partnered with McKinley Building Corporation on the park’s construction.

According to a master plan, the park will have 13 buildings once complete, ranging from 84,000 to 1 million square feet and encompassing a combined area of more than 3.2 million square feet. The proposed structures will be shell buildings that can be leased or sold.

Scott Satterfield, CEO of Wilmington Business Development, said the industrial park gives his group the tools it needs to draw new business and industry to the growing corridor.

“In today's economic landscape, it is imperative that we have quality product to distinguish our region versus competition,” he said Thursday. “Edgewater and McKinley have pioneered to create an inventory of sites, move-in-ready buildings that continue to prioritize the greater Wilmington region for significant economic development opportunities.”

Satterfield also credited New Hanover County with installing the water and sewer infrastructure along the U.S. 421 corridor, which made the ongoing growth possible. 

Bill Rivenbark, chair of the New Hanover County Board of Commissioners, said the county’s “strategic investments” helped lay the groundwork for major investments like the Wilmington Trade Center.

Construction of the 10 buildings proposed in the park’s second phase is expected to require approximately $82 million in direct investment and an estimated $8.8 million in infrastructure. The new buildings could add $300 million to $400 million to the county’s property tax base and generate more than 1,500 jobs for the area.

Last spring, county leaders approved roughly $3.3 million in incentives for the project. The agreement structures the incentive money into three payment buckets based on infrastructure investments, direct site investments and jobs created.

Per the agreement, the company could receive no more than one-third of the total incentive amount in a single year, and the infrastructure and direct investments would be paid on a “pro-rata basis.”