Located on the west side of Carter Lake and a mile north of TD Ameritrade Park lies 70 acres which have been largely untouched and underutilized for decades. The site has been owned by a local demolition contractor and used as a landfill for its projects. You may remember Omaha World-Herald articles from a few years ago indicating the City and Greater Omaha Chamber were working on this property as the North Omaha industrial park with the potential to bring life back to the area and provide jobs to North Omaha. Unfortunately, that project fell through in 2011 and 2012. Clean-up costs were estimated at $20 million to $25 million, and the City could not justify this cost for redevelopment.

In the summer of 2018, RJ Neary, Ryan Zabrowski and Ryan Kuehl met with Parkway Properties to discuss the potential to redevelop this site. Knowing the previous project was too costly to create building sites, we looked at alternative uses which could still provide jobs. Instead of the work needed to make the sites ready for new buildings, we are looking at outdoor uses which would not require the same degree of site work and at much lower costs. Uses might include rail transportation loading, trailer storage for commercial freight or transportation companies, and dirt farming. Parkway determined that this approach at much lower development costs made economic sense and moved forward with closing in October of 2019.

With Planning Board, City Council and environmental requirements behind us, the project team has started site clean-up on the south half of the property. Our project management coordinator Jason Velinsky is working to clear overgrown brush and crush above-grade concrete on site and recycle it for internal roads and storage areas. Our team is very excited about bringing life back to this forgotten property, and new jobs to this part of the city.

This article appeared in our company newsletter in December of 2019. Please click here to download the entire newsletter.