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Uptown Village To Add To Cedar Hill’s Shopping Luster

January 26, 2008

By MARIA HALKIAS / The Dallas Morning News
mhalkias@dallasnews.com

The booming U.S. Highway 67 corridor in southern Dallas County is about to get its first upscale retail: Uptown Village at Cedar Hill.

Like new high-end shopping centers in Southlake, Highland Village and Garland, this will be an “outdoor lifestyle center.” It will open March 12 with stores such as Chico’s, Coldwater Creek and American Eagle Outfitters.

Meanwhile, seven miles up the road, the 1970s-era Southwest Center mall sits half-empty after years of neglect from retailers and shoppers.

Uptown Village has lured the Dillard’s department store from the mall and is hoping to do the same with Macy’s.

For many years, Southwest Center’s troubles left a stigma on the Dallas area’s southern sector as officials tried to attract retail development. But the developers of Uptown Village say their center will prove the doubters wrong once and for all.

When the 725,000-square-foot Uptown Village opens, the U.S. 67 and FM1382 intersection will have almost 3 million square feet of retail, or the equivalent of 1 ½ Dallas Gallerias.

“We’ve said for years that the demographics were here,” said Cedar Hill City Manager Alan Sims. “We have the biggest concentration of retail to add to, and we draw from all of our surrounding communities.”

Still, developer M.G. “Buddy” Herring, chairman and CEO of Dallas-based MGHerring Group, said it took an extra effort to persuade some retailers to sign on to Uptown Village.

“Difficult? Yes and no,” he said. “Some have been, and we’re still working on several. But when they come down here, very few tenants don’t like it.”

Cedar Hill started becoming the shopping destination for the southern sector at the turn of the century.

Uptown Village “reinforces the vision we had in 2000 for southwest Dallas County,” said Frank Mihalopoulos, principal of Dallas-based development firm Corinth Properties.

Mr. Mihalopoulos developed two of the four corners of the FM1382 intersection.

The Plaza at Cedar Hill opened in 2000, bringing the region its first Barnes & Noble, Marshall’s, Hobby Lobby and other big-box chains, and specialty stores such as Bath & Body Works and Lane Bryant.

In 2003, he started Cedar Hill Village, which includes one of J.C. Penney Co.’s first free-standing stores, and where Cedar Hill’s new municipal building will open this summer.

“What we built is leased and doing very well,” Mr. Mihalopoulos said. The development now includes a Cinemark theater, more retail and restaurants.

And hundreds of office workers are on the way. Plano-based Sandler Southwest Corp. has started building the area’s first high-end office building, which will have 75,000 square feet available by year’s end.

New residents have been coming to southwest Dallas County for years, drawn by the area’s affordable housing and natural beauty. Now, many of the homes being built near Joe Pool Lake start at $400,000.

But unlike in Plano, where a prairie of rooftops is easily visible to retail executives driving down the highway, prospective tenants have to be persuaded that the area’s rolling hills contain enough high-income households to support their stores.

“We’ve taken retailers up in helicopters, and when they see all the big rooftops and pools, then they understand,” said Gar Herring, president of MGHerring Group.

Like an indoor mall, Uptown Village is designed to encourage shoppers to spend a few hours.

The pedestrian-friendly development has an upscale feel, with architectural features reminiscent of Texas town squares, an interactive fountain, children’s play area, an oversize chess and checker board, outdoor air conditioning and several restaurants.

Uptown Village has spaces for 80 specialty stores and restaurants. Buddy Herring said the center is about 70 percent leased or in advanced negotiations.

Besides Dillard’s, Uptown Village’s other two anchors are Dick’s Sporting Goods and Barnes & Noble, which is moving across the highway from where it opened in 2000.

At one end of the center, a pad is cleared and waiting for another 120,000-square-foot department store, where Buddy Herring says he would like to put Macy’s.

But on Friday, Macy’s spokesman Ed Smith said, “There are no plans at this time to close our store in Southwest Center.”

Mark J. Carroll, a longtime resident whose law office is across the street from Uptown Village, said he’s been watching it take shape over the last few months.

“It’s a stellar-looking development. I think it looks like shopping in Southern California or Southlake’s Town Center,” he said. “All the retail development we’ve had so far has been fantastic. We don’t have to commute to shop anymore.”

The city’s contribution to the projects has been “big road improvements,” he said. “That’s been another nice benefit.”

Mr. Carroll said the region has the wealth to support the high-end specialty stores.

“The commercial development may have outstripped the population of Cedar Hill, but it’s growing, and the surrounding population shops here,” Mr. Carroll said. “There’s at least as much wealth to support the stores coming in as there is in South Arlington.”

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