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Businesses, party hail Loop 202 leg
Developers cite area’s potential, freeway access
Publication: East Valley Tribune; Date: 06/24/2005
Another stretch of Loop 202 slated to open Monday means another freewayopening party this weekend — and another area of the East Valley lined up to reap the potential economic benefits.
A two-mile section of the Red Mountain stretch of the freeway will extend traffic from Higley Road to Power Road and add two freeway exits for a total of five in northeast Mesa.
"That’s an awful lot of freeway access for any neighborhood or any business district to have," said Bob McNichols, who is developing what he envisions as a high-end office park around a golf course just off Loop 202 at Higley Road.
The scheduled freeway opening comes one week after traffic was allowed on the Santan Freeway stretch of Loop 202 from Loop 101 to Arizona Avenue in Chandler.
As the freeway snakes around the north and south edges of the East Valley, each new segment makes another portion attractive to business interests by putting it within easy reach of millions more Valley residents.
Commercial real estate broker Marc Pierce said land values have gone up nearly 70 percent in the Falcon Field area since Loop 202 reached Higley. Now he’s marketing two large-scale office projects near Greenfield Road, one to be completed this fall and another that should be available for sale a year later.
He’s focused on this part of Mesa for the last seven years, he said, and now "it’s really all kind of coming together."
Mesa City Councilman Rex Griswold, who represents northeast Mesa, said commercial real estate in the area has been hot since Loop 202 reached Higley Road in January 2003. "Every piece of vacant land, everybody’s putting a bid on to build," he said.
Several office buildings have sprung up along Greenfield Road north and south of Falcon Field, the nation’s seventh-busiest general avia tion airport. Most are still empty but Falcon Field Area Alliance director Lois Yates said having office space ready for move-in is crucial if the area wants to be seriously con sidered by new or relocating companies.
"If you have nothing to show them, you’re eliminated before you get to the next step," she said. The alliance has nine member companies and promotes the area bounded by Loop 202 and Brown Road, and Val Vista Drive and Power Road.
As home to Boeing, Mesa’s second-largest employer, the Falcon Field area is already a big employment center. The new end of Loop 202 at Power Road, meanwhile, is becoming an upper-end retail hub drawing from the Red Mountain Ranch and Las Sendas areas.
Sandy and Cosmo Barbetta are moving Mesa’s first day spa, Cosmo’s, to the Villages at Las Sendas shopping center on Power Road just south of Loop 202, after 20 years at Gilbert and McKellips roads.
Sandy Barbetta said the couple have long considered moving the business closer to their northeast Mesa home, and the arrival of Loop 202 has made it time to act, especially because her clientele includes some 20 Valley TV newscasters.
"For them freeway access is very important because they have to get here from the news station," she said. "It’s easy access for them, and it’s someplace a little more upscale."
Freeway opening WHAT: Rockin’ on the Red Mountain, Part 3 WHEN: 8 to 11 a.m. Saturday, ribbon-cutting ceremony at 9 a.m.
WHERE: Loop 202 between Higley and Power roads; access to the event will be from Power Road, and public parking will be on the freeway’s westbound lanes.
WHAT’S HAPPENING: Ninety businesses and community groups will set up tables along the freeway as people stroll, skate or bike. Food samples will be available, and Sundt Construction, the contractor for the $23 million project, will provide bottled water.
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