LYNNWOOD — The first business in a new retail center has opened at the intersection of 196th Street SW and Highway 99.
LA Fitness at 19800 Highway 99 is one of 15 businesses that will comprise the Lynnwood Crossroads Shopping Center. The fitness company’s new gym opened on Oct. 17 and is in one of six new buildings on the site.
“By the end of November, there will be four or five other (businesses) that will be open,” said Will Daniels, property manager with Bellevue-based Sterling Realty Organization. “They’re going to be fairly simultaneous.”
Other businesses set to be located in the Lynnwood Crossroads Shopping Center include Best Sushi and Teriyaki, Five Guys Burgers and Fries, Great Clips, Hop Jack’s, Qdoba Mexican Grill, Starbucks, Verizon and Yogurtland.
Work on the project that encompasses approximately 12.5 acres began in September 2012. Sterling Realty Organization in the early 1960s built and operated the Lynn Twin Theater on the property. The theater expanded and was renamed the Lynn 4 Theater before closing in the mid-1980s. Its building was used as a warehouse by the nonprofit World Concern until it was torn down last year to clear the ground for the shopping center.
Sterling Realty Organization over the years bought up properties near the Lynn 4 Theater until the company assembled enough acreage to build Lynnwood Crossroads, Daniels said.
“The vision was to construct a shopping center here of some size,” he said. “It was never an amount of contiguous property but we were patient and, in the end, we were able to pull it off.”
The $25 million project has a historical name, Daniels added. The intersection of Highway 99 and 196th Street SW, which has also been referred to as Edmonds-Alderwood Road, has traditionally been called Lynnwood Crossroads. A Community Transit Swift station at the intersection is also named Crossroads.
The 123,000-square-foot retail center was designed to be pedestrian friendly while still able to accommodate cars, said Tony Pydych, a project manager with JPC Architects in Bellevue.
“That intersection is one of the most highly used in terms of traffic flow so from a retail developer perspective it’s a really nice location for that fact,” he said. “It’s really a puzzle. We tried to organize the parking in a way that it creates these pedestrian channels.”
Lynnwood Crossroads will include a park at the intersection, Pydych said. The open space will be accessible for walkers and include lighting and rock features as part of the landscape.
Pydych added that he expects construction of the complex to still be ongoing for about the next eight months. The feedback about the shopping center he’s received so far has been positive.
“I think there’s a lot of excitement,” he said. “There’s going to be a lot more choice for folks to go and shop and eat locally.”
For more information about Lynnwood Crossroads and project updates, visit www. lynnwoodcrossroads.com.
More from The Herald Business Journal: www.theheraldbusinessjournal.com
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