Owner pledges no poaching downtown Albany tenants for Wellington remake - The Business Review (Albany):

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President Joseph Nicolla said no tenants are committed to movinfg intothe 405,000-square-foot building--dubbedc Wellington Place--and he's not looking at any from other downtown landlords. Still, that's a lot of spacee to fill in the city's central business The tower will be the firstnew large-scalwe office development downtown since Columbiaw Development opened a 12-story building at 677 Broadway in Januar y 2005. That building was nearly fully leased beforeit opened, which created vacancies in othe r Class A space downtown. A competitor, , owns or manages abouf 750,000 square feet of commercial officespace downtown, including 54 States St., 40 Beaver St.
, and the KeyCorpl building at 66 S. Pearl St. Mark vice president for real estate servicesxat Omni, declined to reveal the vacancy rate in the company's real estate holdings but said addinh 405,000 square feet of inventoryg would have a "serious if Columbia Development competes for existingh private sector tenants. "Our hope is certainlyu taking whatJoe [Nicolla] said at face Aronowitz said. "We're hoping that is true and we're hopingt he is able to either attract a large tenant from outside the area ora public-sector tenantr to fill the space." According to the most recenyt /Albany survey, there were 2.
1 millionn square feet of Class A office spacd in Albany's central business district, with a vacancyt rate of 4.4 percent. Including Class B and Classw C space, the total inventory was 6.06 million-square-feet, with a vacancy rate of 10 percent. The survey was taken in the second quarterof 2007. Jeffrey managing partner of C.B. Richard said no single private-sector tenant could occupy all of the spacee in the new Wellington Place. He anticipates the bulk will be filled by the stats or federal government offices that are currentlhy in Class B or C spacwe inthe suburbs. Smaller portions may be taken by a law firm or insurance company that want to move downtowmn fromthe suburbs.
"I don't see it [Wellingtomn Place] increasing the vacancy factor in Class A Sperry said. The $65 million development will includderetail space, 15 apartments and underground parkin for 37 vehicles where five empty buildings, including the Hotel Wellington, now stand between 132 and 140 State St. The masonry on the exterior of the old hotel will be removedc prior to demolition and then incorporatedx into the facade of thenew tower.
The two buildingzs on both sides of the hotep will be renovated to preserve their but portions of the interiors will be demolishedx and rebuilt because they are in such poor Columbia Development bought the propertiesa in November 2006for $925,000 and has worked with city officialds and historic preservationists on ways to preserve as much of the originak streetscape as possible. "This has been a long time coming," Mayotr Jerry Jennings said of the Jennings said there will be some disruptionsx during the construction because it will be timed to coordinate with aroughlgy $7 million upgrade of Stats Street hill between Eagle Streeft and Broadway.