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Published February 2004
BUILDING
COMMUNITY
Developer is enjoying his role in the creation
of Mill Creek Town Center
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| Snohomish County
Business Journal/JOHN WOLCOTT Eric Jacobsen (left) and his father, “Red,” review plans for their three-story office building, Park Place Center (in the background), in the new Mill Creek Town Center. The facility will include offices for Eric Jacobsen’s Sound Financial Management business, a 300-seat La Palmera Mexican restaurant and several other businesses. |
By
John Wolcott
SCBJ Editor
For most developers, building Mill Creek’s first “town center” is a historic occasion, an opportunity to be part of creating a focal point for this upscale, master-planned residential community of 12,000, giving it a “heart,” making it a gathering place that will be a unique civic, cultural and commercial experience.
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What’s
happening After 10 years of discussion and planning, Mill Creek’s new Town Center is under construction, coming to life with the building of a new Main Street and public plazas where private developers are beginning the creation of 300,000 square feet of commercial space that will feature retail stores, office buildings, a supermarket, a fitness center, a public plaza and fountains. When that upscale community was planned 28 years ago, the focus was on a golf course, hundreds of homes and a few acres of shopping center development, with little thought given to a downtown focal point. But since the city’s incorporation in 1983, there’s been a lot of thinking about how to create a civic identity, said Bill Trimm, Mill Creek’s community development director. Now, homebuilders John and William Buchan, who have helped to build Mill Creek’s enviable residential environment, are developing the city’s new Town Center streets, sidewalks, utilities and other infrastructure. In their first commercial venture, they are marketing land to developers on the first 10 commercial lots, just north of an existing shopping center at the Bothell-Everett Highway and 164th Street SW. They cleared 16 acres of wooded land to develop up to 233,000 square feet of retail and office space in the new urban-village development, expected to hold 10 buildings in the first phase. The city also plans a second phase in Town Center with as many as 10 more mixed-use buildings, including a 35,000-square-foot community center. —
John Wolcott, |
But for developer “Red” Jacobsen of Mukilteo, who’s building one of the first structures in the new center and then launching construction of five more buildings plus an adjacent public plaza, the Town Center project is more than all of that. To him, it’s just plain fun.
Always on the move, and ready with a quick grin, Jacobsen balances the demanding schedules and complexities of design reviews with the city, conferences with architects, monitoring contractors and negotiating financing with an energy that belies his 66 years.
“This is exciting,” he said. “Our first building’s tenants will include a 300-seat La Palmera Mexican restaurant on the second floor, my son Eric’s business — Sound Financial Management — and an ice cream business, specialty retail stores, a medical office and condominiums.”
Outside will be fountains and sculptures of Northwest animals, probably bears, and landscaping to enhance both the building and the Town Center in general, he said. The Mexican restaurant will include balcony dining, where guests can watch the growing of the community’s new downtown as future buildings are erected.
To the south, ground is already being cleared for more offices and retail buildings that will be home to a variety of businesses. LA Fitness, a gym-club chain, is reportedly considering a location, according to Constance Wilde, a CB Richard Ellis vice president who is marketing Town Center properties.
The far south end of the Town Center will be anchored by a 56,000-square-foot Central Market, part of the Town & Country Markets grocery business that also operates stores in Shoreline and Poulsbo.
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SCBJ FOCUS: ‘RED’ JACOBSEN
Three decades ago, at 36, Red Jacobsen was diagnosed with cancer. He not only survived his struggle against that illness, he also discovered a new, active, more determined lifestyle that sustains him in his role as a land developer at the new Mill Creek Town Center. “I was pretty mild-mannered until that time in my life,” the Seattle native said. “But then I became pretty aggressive, working with a vengeance to get my mind off my cancer. I got really charged up, and it made me much stronger.” For years he owned a profitable business — Pacific Marketing Associates — selling auto parts up and down the West Coast to Schuck’s, Pay ‘n Pak, Ernst Hardware and others as a sales rep in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Alaska for numerous companies. After selling that business to try retirement, he joined his son, Eric, in his Mill Creek business, Sound Financial Management. After he saw plans for the new town center on a bulletin board at city hall, he liked the idea so much he couldn’t resist starting a new career as a developer, forming Jacobsen Development LLC so he could participate in making major changes to the city where he and his family once lived. With his first building due to open around late February, he has already won financial backing for his second development: five office buildings and a public plaza in the new town center. “I’m having fun,” he said, grinning. |
To the north of Jacobsen’s three-story, 30,000-square-foot Park Place Center, on the other side of the new Main Street bridge over Mill Creek, is Mill Creek Court, a three-story, 16,000-square-foot facility built by financial advisers Rolf Trautmann and Dennis Maher. The offices for Trautmann Maher & Associates are on the third floor, the second floor is open for leasing and a street-level deli, the Tuscadeli Café, is open for business.
Across the street is Jacobsen’s next project, Creekside Village, a Tuscan-style outdoor shopping area with 44,000 square feet of retail space in three buildings adjacent to a public plaza. About 40 percent of the space is already leased, and ground hasn’t been broken yet for construction, he said.
“This will really be attractive to the public,” Jacobsen said. “There will be a covered, heated stage for public events, from music to a Leavenworth-style Christmas tree-lighting ceremony. We’ll have a schedule of activities out by next summer, and we’ll be building a public fountain area with figures of a giraffe, an elephant and other animals for people to enjoy.”
City Manager Bob Stowe said, “The city’s vision is to have a good mix of quality local, national and regional retail stores.”
Demographics for the Mill Creek area support that development vision. Although the city’s population is small, a $49,500 study financed by the city shows that at least 20,000 vehicles pass the Town Center site each day and that an estimated 86,661 people live within a five-minute drive of the site. Their average annual household income tops $82,000. By 2007, the population in that area is expected to grow to 94,749.
To help manage the heavy traffic flows in the area, a section of Highway 527 is being widened to the north of the development, between the Town Center and Murphy’s Corner. Nearly 1,000 residential living units are under construction or planned near the site.
When the new Town Center is finished it will be far different than shopping malls or office centers, Jacobsen said. “It will be a public activity place for relaxing, shopping, working and celebrating city activities.”
Related: Development of city centers is regional, national trend
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