2534 development puts Johnstown on the map

JOHNSTOWN — When you think about retail meccas in Northern Colorado, the quiet community of Johnstown probably doesn’t leap to mind. But a recent reboot is about to change all that.

The 2534 project, on the southeast corner of Interstate 25 and U.S. Highway 34, is surging forward on the news that sporting goods retailer Scheels will serve as a massive anchor.

According to Johnstown Town Planner John Franklin, the 542-acre site was targeted for development by town officials in the late 1990s. “They decided to no longer just be content with their status as an agricultural service community and wanted to reach out to what we refer to as the ‘Main Street of Colorado,’ that being I-25,” he said. With that in mind, the annexation process was started in 2000 and the first infrastructure improvements began around 2005. But progress has been slow.

“We got off to a fantastic start,” said Ryan Schaefer, chief executive of Chrisland Commercial Real Estate, one of four developers working on the project. “We were absorbing property very quickly with some high-quality users in 2006 and 2007, and then the Great Recession hit. Like a lot of other places, 2534 didn’t see much growth from 2008 through 2013.”

Anyone who has driven past the property the last few years can attest to that. While many of the roads are in place, only a handful of stores and restaurants currently dot Johnstown Plaza, the retail component on the west end of the development.

While the rebounding economy certainly has breathed new life into the commercial sector, Schaefer and Franklin acknowledge it was the Scheels deal that has put this project into overdrive.

“We’d been calling on Scheels for a number of years,” Schaefer said. The retailer has 25 outlets in 11 states and had been looking for a suitable location along the I-25 corridor.

“Once they figured out there was a great site that was highly visible, that was right at the confluence of the region’s two main trade routes, that also had infrastructure in place, I think it was kind of a no-brainer for them to settle on this site,” he said.

Schaefer also gives credit to the community of Johnstown, calling it a “fantastic” environment for business.

“They’ve got expedited planning approvals and low development impact fees and they’re very responsive to new development,” he said. “They’re really a model for communities along the Front Range right now.”

Other parties agree, including Allen Schlup of Carson Development, the primary general contractor for Johnstown Plaza, who also worked with Scheels on a project in Overland Park, Kan.

“Scheels has been trying to come to Colorado for a long time, they just weren’t able to put a deal together,” he said. After looking at multiple sites, they settled on the 2534 location mainly because of the amenable business climate. “A large part of this deal was the cooperation with Johnstown, which has been better than any other municipality I’ve ever worked with,” Schlup said.

Roy Lauricello, Johnstown’s town manager, said the outcome will be well worth it.

“It’s certainly going to enhance our sales tax base, that’s for sure, and our property tax base, and it will improve the level of services we’re able to provide the citizens of Johnstown with the increased revenue.”

Beyond the retail aspect, the project also will include office/medical space, commercial, light industrial, and a 254-unit apartment complex. According to Schaefer, “Our traffic study in 2004 anticipated about 4 million square feet of commercial and industrial space at 2534 when it’s all said and done.”

The Scheels store alone will account for 250,000 square feet, the second-largest retail facility in the state. By comparison, the Cabela’s stores recently built in Thornton and Lone Tree each are roughly 110,000 square feet, and a typical Costco is about 150,000 square feet. “So you could basically take a Cabela’s and a Costco and combine them and that would be about the size of the Scheels store,” Schaefer said. It’s also expected to provide upwards of 400 jobs when it opens in September 2017.

When complete, Johnstown Plaza will encompass nearly 1 million square feet of retail space, with an estimated cost of about $300 million.

“As for the total 2534 project, I’m sure it will be north of $1 billion,” Schaefer said.

Those figures prompt Lauricello to note, “That’s pretty great for a small community, isn’t it.”

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