Construction Begins on First Fast-Food Restaurants For Grand Morton Town Center in North Katy

3/13/17

Construction is getting underway on the initial wave of fast-food restaurants for freeway-fronting pad sites in Grand Morton Town Center, an 89-acre regional power center in Katy's high-growth northern tier.

Taco Bell will be going vertical in the coming weeks on a 29,815-sf ground-leased pad site. McDonald's too will soon be coming out of the ground on a 67,894-sf pad site at the hard corner of Grand Parkway (TX 99) and Morton Ranch Road. Both restaurants will open in late summer.Taco Bell's general contractor isJerry Kachel Builder Inc. of Spring, Texas, and McDonald's is Houston-based BE & DE Construction.

Coming on line at year's end will be Whataburger and Chick-Fil-A, which have ground leased 42,574 sf and 59,699 sf, respectively. Their pad sites front Grand Parkway, a 180-mile outer loop around Houston, at the last free exit for Interstate 10 N.

"There is a huge void in this area for fast-food restaurants," says Josh Friedlander, an associate for Houston-based NewQuest Properties, the developer.

The NewQuest project, which will total 600,459 sf at build-out, features a perimeter ringed with 16 pad sites for a select mix of dining, banking and retail. To date, Friedlander and his partner, Rebecca Le, have leased seven pad sites. Grand Morton Town Center is anchored by a 125,531-sf Kroger Marketplace, which opened last October.

"Demand has been extremely strong for inline space and pad sites," Friedlander says. "The spark clearly is the new home growth in this part of Katy."

In fourth quarter 2016, buyers closed on 1,680 homes within a five-mile radius of Grand Morton Town Center. The fast-growing sector now boasts 389,644 residents in the seven-mile trade area, where the average annual household income is $108,000 and the median age is 33.

"A lot of retail opportunities were created when this section of the Grand Parkway was completed," Friedlander says. "The industry quickly identified this spot as the main regional intersection off 99 between I-10 and 290."

With fast-food sites under construction, Friedlander and his leasing partner, Rebecca Le, are now courting full-service, sit-down and fast-casual concepts for the project. "A well-rounded mix of dining options, retail and community services will build in sustainability and draw customers coming and going from their homes."

Grand Morton Town Center has direct access to Grand Parkway plus nearly three-quarters of a mile frontage along Morton Ranch Road. NewQuest's property neighbors thousands of rooftops and is less than a five-minute drive from Cinco Ranch, one of the nation's top-selling residential communities. Greater Houston's leading employment centers, the Energy Corridor, and downtown are within an easy commute.

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