The I-85 industrial corridor, which stretches more than 660 miles from Montgomery, Alabama to Petersburg, Virginia, continues to see outsized investment by users and developers alike. The corridor’s top industrial markets benefit from business-friendly state and local legislatures, legacy labor pools, developable land with few barriers to entry and population growth.
Chip Watson, managing principal of SRS Real Estate Partners, says that what’s underway in Atlanta is a different look than in years past.
“If you go back five years and you’re looking at what was being built, you probably saw 500,000 square feet and above,” says Watson. “The market dynamics have changed over time. In the past two years, we have started seeing smaller buildings being built. We are back to more traditional 250,000-square-foot buildings with shared parking and nice facilities.”
“General inflation has changed the dynamics across the board and impacts what’s being built,” says Watson about the uptick in construction materials and land pricing. “That has forced more automation into general warehousing as well as manufacturing.”
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