Hillwood touts its success at Alliance

[gc]

Hillwood touts its success at Alliance
By Andrea Jares - Star-Telegram Staff Writer
http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/business/7018324.htm

FORT WORTH - Despite a sluggish economy, 14 companies have added operations at Alliance Airport business parks in the past year, adding 1,400 jobs to the regional economy, Hillwood development officials told a Fort Worth city committee Tuesday.

Hillwood, Ross Perot Jr.'s company that is developing the 15,000 acres of industrial and commercial business parks, made its annual update to the Fort Worth Central City Revitalization and Economic Development Committee, composed of city staff and council members.

According to Hillwood figures, 125 companies with operations in the Alliance developments contributed $2.1 billion to the local economy last year, bringing to $21 billion the total impact since the development opened in 1990.

That impact includes payroll for more than 20,000 workers at the sprawling business parks 15 miles north of downtown Fort Worth.

It also includes property taxes paid to various entities, including at least three school districts, several cities and Denton and Tarrant counties, plus construction, utilities and the goods and services that workers buy.

"It's really a success story, and I really don't think we realize what a major event has occurred up there," said Fort Worth City Councilman Jim Lane, one of three council members in attendance, along with Wendy Davis and John Stevenson.

One of every three people who work at companies operating at Alliance are Fort Worth residents, said Mike Berry, president of Hillwood Properties.

That percentage will likely increase as the housing boom continues to explode across the northern edges of Fort Worth, Berry said.

"As the housing gets closer to us and the housing is in Fort Worth, that helps us make a connection between Alliance employment and Fort Worth, which I know is very important to the city," Berry said.

The city approved tax breaks and incentives for the development of the business parks and many of their resident companies.

It also paid to build the airport, which is the centerpiece of the development and is operated by Hillwood through a contract with the city.

The funds invested in Alliance have mainly come from private investment. Alliance's annual report indicates that 3.5 percent of the $4.7 billion invested in Alliance over the past 12 years has been public dollars.

Also, only five of the 81 companies located in Fort Worth -- American Airlines, Nokia, JC Penney, Tech Data and Bell -- have tax abatements, according to the report.

Hillwood officials were unable to say how many jobs may have been cut by Alliance businesses last year, even as 1,400 jobs were added. Several have trimmed work forces, including GulfStream, which announced in July that it would close an aircraft design center that employed 49.

And the new jobs do not match the pace of previous years. Alliance businesses added about 2,000 workers in 2001 and about 3,000 in 2000, said David Pelletier, Hillwood spokesman.

But Alliance is still a bright spot in a slumping economy. The Fort Worth-Arlington area had a net loss of 5,000 jobs in the past year, said Bud Weinstein, director of the Center for Economic Development and Research at the University of North Texas in Denton.

Among the new businesses opening at Alliance in the past year are Motorola, IESI, Andersen Logistics, AIG, Ford and The Triangle Network.

The largest of those was Motorola, which added 800 jobs when it transferred a distribution operation from Chicago.

The economic impact of Alliance is not just felt in Fort Worth. Surrounding school districts and cities also benefit from the property taxes and economic activity around Alliance Airport.

Alliance put student and housing growth in the Keller school district on fast-forward.

Keller schools have reaped $39.7 million in the past 12 years from Alliance company property taxes, according to Insight Research. The district has added 12 new schools since 1996, with two more planned for next year.

"Keller is one of the fastest-growing [cities] in the whole state and is one of three in the region moving at a quick clip," said Jason Meyer, spokesman for the Keller school district.

At Northwest school district, which has received $108.5 million in Alliance property taxes over the past 12 years, Alliance contributes more than just dollars, said spokeswoman Angela Scott. Alliance company employees are mentors for students and contributors to school programs.

In the coming weeks, Fort Worth will use the information if there are opportunities for helping Alliance continue its growth, said Tom Higgins, director of the city's economic development department.

Hillwood's Berry also said that in the next 10 years the Alliance area will begin to need infrastructure improvements.

Alliance will work on finding long-term solutions to traffic bottlenecks that are the result of the rapid growth in north Fort Worth and could eventually have a negative effect on growth in the area, he said.

Alliance also will concentrate on adding more retail and entertainment components to the tax base.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Andrea Jares, (817) 685-3851 ajares@star-telegram.com

[tamtagon]

Does anyone know how much traffic this airport handles in a year?

[tamtagon]

http://www.aircargoworld.com/directo...4_ad/index.htm

I hope I'm presenting valid comparasons. By far incomplete, the list below gives perspective of the traffic through Alliance Airport as compared to the nation's busiest. Looks like Alliance has cargo space availability to become one of the busiest cargo airports in the country. I'm not sure if data reported under "Total '02 Aircraft Movements" represent cargo only, or if passenger planes are included. I do find it interesting that Alliance Airport, being owned by the city of Fort Worth, was not challenged with similar restrictions as Love Field.

The data below relate to non-passenger cargo traffic:


ALLIANCE AIRPORT

Air Service:
Total Carriers: 2,
All-Cargo: 1,
Non-Scheduled Charter: Ad Hoc Only

Cargo Space:
Total Ramp/Tarmac Surface for Cargo Handling: 3,500,000 s.f.

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 197,314 m.t. -8 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 88,340, -49 percent.

DALLAS/FT WORTH INT'L AIRPORT

Air Service:
Total Carriers: 57,
All-Cargo: 20,
Non-Scheduled Charter: 20

Cargo Space:
Total Ramp/Tarmac Surface for Cargo Handling: 2,283,000 s.f.
Warehouse Space: 2,600,000 s.f.

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 739,734 tons., -10 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 765,109, -2.4 percent.


HOUSTON AIRPORT SYSTEM
George Bush Intercontinental Airport, 16930 JFK Boulevard, Houston, TX 77032.

Air Service:
Total Carriers: 35,
All-Cargo: 11,
Non-Scheduled Charter: 10

Cargo Space:
Total Ramp/Tarmac Surface for Cargo Handling: IAH CargoCenter 2,000,000 s.f. and IAH Central Cargo Area 500,000 s.f.
Warehouse Space: 800,000 s.f.

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 253,155 m.t., +4 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 456,831, -3 percent.

SAN ANTONIO INT'L AIRPORT

Air Service:
Total Carriers: 13,
All-Cargo: 3,
Non-Scheduled Charter: 2 (varies)

Cargo Space:
Total Ramp/Tarmac Surface for Cargo Handling: 1,294,736 s.f.
Warehouse Space: 164,280 s.f.

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 97,636 m.t., +22.7 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 234,417 -0.8 percent.


HARTSFIELD ATLANTA INT'L AIRPORT

Air Service:
Total Carriers: 35,
All-Cargo: 17,
Non-Scheduled Charter: 2

Cargo Space:
Total Ramp/Tarmac Surface for Cargo Handling: 2.0 million s.f.
Warehouse Space: 1.5 million s.f.

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 734,083 m.t., -0.2 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 889,966, +0.1 percent.


CHICAGO O'HARE INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

Air Service:
Total Carriers: 83,
All-Cargo: 31,
Non-Scheduled Charter: 2

Cargo Space:
Total Ramp/Tarmac Surface for Cargo Handling: 2,932,360 s.f.
Warehouse Space: 2,615,433 s.f.

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 1,436,385 tons, +1.6 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 922,817, +1.2 percent.


LOS ANGELES WORLD AIRPORTS

Total Carriers: 106,
All-Cargo: 34

Cargo Space:
Total Ramp/Tarmac Surface for Cargo Handling: 170 acres.
Warehouse Space: 2.1 million s.f.

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 1,962,354 tons, +0.3 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 645,424, +12.6 percent.

JOHN F. KENNEDY INT'L AIRPORT

Total Carriers: 115,
All-Cargo: 38.

Cargo Space: 4.1 million s.f.
Warehouse Space: 4.1 million s.f

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 1,574,462 m.t., -1.1 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 274,485, -5.5 percent

edit: oops, forgot to include the busiest cargo airport (haha):

MEMPHIS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

Air Service:
Total Carriers: 22,
All-Cargo: 10,
Non-Scheduled Charter: 7

Cargo Space:
Total Ramp/Tarmac Surface for Cargo Handling: 7 stretch 8s simutaneously.
Warehouse Space: 100,000 s.f.

Traffic:
Total '02 Tonnage: 3,390,299 m.t., +28.8 percent.
Total '02 Aircraft Movements: 398,769, +1 percent.

[rantanamo]

I'm sure it'll be a future dispute

[tamtagon]

Maybe Alliance should try to crack into the internation cargo market. It kinda seems like a logical step with the three metroplex airports to have most of the cargo traffic at Alliance, most of the interstate and international passenger service at DFW and most of the intrastate traffic at Love Field.

[freewaytincan]

What's with the loss of traffic at DFW and Alliance?

[CTroyMathis]

Soaring Alliance
Once just an airport, AllianceTexas keeps growing at a record pace
Aleshia Claunch - September 26, 2005
Visit: http://www.fwbusinesspress.com/display.php?id=3816



With the ink barely dry on its latest lease agreement, Hillwood Development Company is poised to top its own record for the most square footage leased in a year at the company’s 17-year-old AllianceTexas development.

Thanks to a rental agreement signed with Teleflex Medical on Sept. 19, the Dallas-based real estate development company has leased more than 2.5 million square feet of office, residential and retail space in 2005.

“When we first started, we were an airport, then we were industrial and now as we continue to grow in residential, we have really moved into the next phase, which is retail and office development – so we’ll continue on,” said Bill Burton, senior vice president of Hillwood Properties. “We’ve been fortunate this year and it’s not over yet.”

Located in northern Fort Worth, AllianceTexas is a 17,000-acre, mixed-use community planned and developed by Dallas’ Hillwood Development Company. Ross Perot Jr., son of Dallas billionaire and two-time presidential candidate H. Ross Perot, controls Hillwood Development.

Once undeveloped farmland in northern Tarrant and southwest Denton counties, the area has grown to include more than 130 companies and has created over 24,000 full-time jobs. Office, residential and commercial real estate is currently under construction within the large acreage located near Alliance Airport, and many developments have been completed.

Some of AllianceTexas’ most notable leases during 2005 include ATC Logistics, Triangle Logistics, DynCorp International and IDC.

Burton said the list of leases proves that Alliance is well on its way to becoming the industrial, retail, residential and office mecca it was designed to be.

“Clearly we’re entering into a new phase in Alliance,” Burton said. “And it’s broader than industrial. The phrase is overused, but it’s truly a ‘work, live, play environment’ and it’s getting better by the day.”

To date, AllianceTexas features 1,000 single-family homes and more than 130 companies that occupy 23.9 million square feet. Burton said that 62 of the companies within Alliance are ranked on the Fortune 500, Global 500 or Forbes List of Top Private Firms.

Hillwood Spokesman David Pelletier said that many businesses chose the Alliance development because of its location.

Teleflex was one such business.

“AllianceTexas provides a high quality building that has access to major highways,” said James Pino, director of logistics and distribution for Teleflex Medical. “Alliance has been competitively priced and easy to work with.”

In 1988, Hillwood constructed Fort Worth Alliance Airport as a regional industrial airport to give industrial aircraft a convenient alternative to Dallas-Fort Worth Airport.

AllianceTexas entered a new phase in 1989, when the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad company built an intermodal yard that acted as a distribution hub for cargo containers shipped from across the nation. Pelletier said the cargo docking station was a catalyst for industrial and distribution facilities in the northern Fort Worth area.

Development accelerated in 2000, when Hillwood completed a 400,000-square-foot distribution facility. With that building completed, Hillwood secured a tenant, Ryder Systems Inc. The rest, Pelletier said, is history.

Some of the businesses located within Alliance today include Bell Helicopter’s training academy, Cabela’s outdoor supply store and an airplane hanger for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

AllianceTexas includes three distinct developments: Alliance, a business and industrial community; Heritage, a residential community; and Circle T Ranch, which features a high-end golf course surrounded by residential, retail and business development.

Sprawling across four cities – Fort Worth, Haslet, Roanoke and Westlake – the development has acreage in two counties, Tarrant and Denton; and three school districts: Westlake, Northwest and Keller.

Pelletier said Circle T Ranch is its own mini-city, complete with office space that houses corporate campuses for Fidelity Investments and DaimlerChrysler. Also planned: a 1 million-square-foot shopping mall, The Shops at Circle T.

Also within Circle T is an exclusive residential development called Vaquero. Pelletier said the private project includes 300 homes – many valued at more than $1 million – in a gated community with a nearby high-dollar golf course. Membership in the golf club is restricted to the development’s homeowners.

“The golf club will do anything for homeowners,” he said. “They will pick up your dry cleaning or go grocery shopping for you. It’s another world.”

Pelletier said that Vaquero’s residents include professional golfers and other famous athletes. The development offers a private school, Westlake Academy.

Heritage contains commercial and light industrial construction, but the focus of the area is middle-to upper-income residential.

Each of the small communities within the Heritage development has its own neighborhood clubhouse with a community pool, plus tennis and volleyball courts. Communities also have their own intranet, available by password to anyone who lives in Heritage. Pelletier said the intranet system allows homeowners to share information such as their favorite babysitters and lawn-service companies. Intranets are private networks not connected to the Internet. Homeowners can log in to the network via their computers.

“We want them to be able to post the weekly poker game on the intranet and share recipes,” Pelletier said. “It’s a cutting-edge development.”

The community intranets are possible because Heritage homeowners have fiber optics under the streets leading to hubs in front of the homes. Pelletier said that Hillwood provided the fiber optics to the hubs and it is the homeowners’ duty to connect the hub to their homes.

Located within Heritage are two elementary schools with a third under construction, a high school and plans to add a private Catholic school. Heritage also includes a 50-acre Fort Worth city park.

Homes in Heritage range from $140,000 to $300,000, Pelletier said.

So far, AllianceTexas has developed 4,000 acres, which represents about 25 percent of the available land. Pelletier said construction within Alliance will continue for the next 15 to 20 years.

“This is a project of huge proportions,” he said. “It has taken 15 years to get where we are; the ball is just beginning to get rolling.”

On the horizon is a plethora of residential and commercial development, including Saratoga – the only residential neighborhood that will be located within the main Alliance development – and Alliance Town Center, which is set to break ground within the week.

“We’re going to be here for a long time,” Pelletier said. “We’re not going anywhere, so we’re going to do it right and people who come to live and work here know that. That’s why they want to come here.

[tamtagon]

In 1988, Hillwood constructed Fort Worth Alliance Airport as a regional industrial airport to give industrial aircraft a convenient alternative to Dallas-Fort Worth Airport.

I'm certainly glad this Hillwood development is able to generate substantial growth in Tarrant and Denton counties, but it hardly seems right that a new airport has been built for industrial aircraft which does not have the same destination restrictions as put on passenger service through Love Field.

[John Peter Smith]

DFW was built primarily for passenger traffic. Alliance was built soley for industrial aircraft. There is a big difference. I don't believe the city would ever allow passenger service from Alliance, and presently, there are no terminals or gates from which to operate a passenger airline. The few airlines that have tried passenger service from Fort Worth have all originated from Meacham, which is much closer to downtown and has a terminal and gates from which to fly. I remember several years ago some whining was heard from Bid D when FedEx located their hub at Alliance and not DFW. A FedEx official stated point blank, DFW was not, and would not be considered, that they did not want to operate from an airport with so many passenger flights. To say that Alliance competes with DFW is like saying Red Bird or Addison competes with DFW.

[NThomas]

Alliance at 20: Continuing to impact area economy
Fort Worth Business Press
December 21, 2009
BY ALESHIA HOWE
Full Article

Through 2008 Fort Worth’s sprawling AllianceTexas development has had a $36.4 billion economic impact on North Texas since its start, according to the latest impact study commissioned by its developer.

Coinciding with the north Fort Worth development’s 20th anniversary, Alliance’s creator, Hillwood Properties, hired Insight Research to perform the economic impact report, which shows the ever present impact of the multi-purpose development.

In addition to the overall impact, the report shows the 229 companies currently in AllinaceTexas have built 31.2 million square feet and created 28,000 jobs. And since the development began, the companies and residents of AllianceTexas also have paid more than $730 million in property taxes, including more than $105 million in 2008...

[tamtagon]

While the Dallas Inland (aka) Logistics (aka) Intermodal Hub (aka) Port has gotten plenty of attention due to a seeming jump-start in construction and seeming down-fall of political corruption, Alliance Texas in Fort Worth leased more space last year than any year before:

BY SANDRA BAKER
sabaker@star-telegram.com

Hillwood Properties says it leased 5 million square feet of space at its AllianceTexas development in far north Fort Worth in 2012, the best year in its 22-year-history.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/02...#storylink=cpy

[tamtagon]

Built it and they will come

Hillwood Properties to build 1.2 million-square-foot industrial building at AllianceTexas in Fort Worth

By HANAH CHO
26 March 2013

Hillwood Properties said Tuesday that it will build a speculative 1.2 million-square-foot industrial building in its AllianceTexas project north of Fort Worth.

...said Jeff Turner, executive vice president of Indiana-based Duke Realty, “People consider Dallas one of the top three distribution hubs in the United States,”