Mayor sets design standard for planned center

Jace Radke

Tuesday, Sept. 26, 2000 | 11:26 a.m.

Plans for the West Coast's largest furniture showroom on a section of the old Union Pacific property downtown will have the city's support as long as it's not a box-shaped warehouse, Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman said.

"I'll give as much support as humanly possible, but the building has to hold to the architectural standard set by the county government building," Goodman said. "This land is the future heart and soul of Southern Nevada, and we have to treat it like a jewel in the desert. It will have to meet triple-A standards."

Officials of International Furniture Mart Limited Liability Company visited the 56-acre project site Monday at Grand Central Parkway near Bonneville Avenue, where a first phase, including 1 million square feet of display space, is scheduled to open in 2002.

When it does open, Goodman won't have to worry about it being an eyesore in the middle of his planned redevelopment of downtown Las Vegas, Union Pacific Special Properties Manager Don Caldwell said.

"The site development standards here are equal or better than the standards for the government building," Caldwell said. "This will be a first class project. I can promise that."

Whatever the International Furniture Mart looks like, it will fit in well with Las Vegas' diversifying economy, said Greg Borgel, a Las Vegas planning consultant who is working on the project.

"The only other major regional furniture showroom like it is in High Point, N.C., and they don't have adequate hotel rooms, restaurants and entertainment. We believe locating this project in Las Vegas will overwhelm anything else in the country.

"It will be like a permanent Comdex of wholesale furniture." Comdex draws about 200,000 visitors each year to the five-day computer trade show.

The furniture complex will sell directly to retailers, who will be able to come to Las Vegas to see a huge array of what furniture manufactures have to offer, Borgel said.

Trade shows will be hosted at the furniture mart every quarter, causing an influx of dealers, but even without the seasonal shows the complex is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of people a year to Las Vegas, Borgel said.

Dan Kush of the California Furniture Manufacturers Association, says he has heard nothing but good things from manufacturers about putting the furniture mart in Las Vegas.

"It's what we've been dreaming of," said Kush, who owns Kushwood Manufacturing, based in Ontario, Calif. "Right now we have to go show at a small facility in San Francisco or out in High Point. San Francisco is getting ridiculously expensive, and High Point doesn't have the hotels. That's not a problem here, with all the rooms and the closeness of the airport.

"There's not going to be a problem getting manufacturers to come here and fill the place."

Michael Kammerling, a retail adviser with Grubb & Ellis Property Solutions Worldwide, will be working on marketing for the furniture mart and its sister retail store that will sell to the general public, which is already approved for a 24-acre-site at the northwest corner of Alta Drive and Martin Luther King Boulevard.

"The retail store is going to be another good reason for people to come to Las Vegas," Kammerling said. "While they are here enjoying themselves, they're going to shop, and the selection at the retail store will be unmatched by anything else they have seen.

"We also know that Las Vegas is a fast-growing city, and all those new homes have to be furnished. People will be able to find everything they need under one roof."

Goodman joined the project's officials at the furniture mart site off Grand Central Parkway Monday afternoon to showcase railroad property to members of the International Association of Corporate Real Estate Executives.

Goodman pointed out, that along with the furniture mart, a high-tech campus backed by AT&T Corp. and Cisco Systems Inc. will be built on 10.64 acres of railroad land.

Also at the gathering were representatives of the Trammell Crow Co. of Scottsdale, Ariz., to tell the executives about plans to build a 400-unit apartment complex on 8.3 acres of land south of a proposed preforming arts center and Bonneville Road.

"This is the start of my dream come true," Goodman said of the plans to develop the railroad land. "This is going to be a very special city. A new Las Vegas steeped in culture, that has the necessities, not amenities, of museums and an arena."