TBJ's Top 24 of '24: The Grounds, $150M, 100-acre development, coming to W-S (No. 3)
A rendering shows the plan for the first phase of The Grounds, a mixed-use development near Wake Forest University by Front Street Capital and Carter.
Front Street Capital / Carter
While there had been hints of what a development planned near Wake Forest University’s sports complexes in northwest Winston-Salem might entail, it was only in September that the ‘wow factor’ truly sunk in.
On Sept. 10, developers unveiled to Triad Business Journal their plans for the The Grounds, a mixed-use project that, at that point, would entail $150 million of investment and span nearly 100 acres. The area is bounded by Whitaker Park, Wake Forest University and the Boston-Thurmond neighborhood, and hosts Allegacy Federal Credit Union Stadium, the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum and the Winston-Salem Fairgrounds. What has largely been a patchwork of underutilized parking lots is now slated to become a pedestrian-centric destination for residential housing, retail, restaurants and office space.
Developers Front Street Capital and Atlanta’s Carter, working in tandem with Wake Forest University and the city of Winston-Salem, revealed then that a first phase of development would bring together four major components: infrastructure and greenways; a 100,000-square-foot office building for WFU; a 240-unit residential community; and a 40,000-square-foot retail village. A second part of Phase 1 – to be known as Phase 1b – is slated to include a hospitality component such as a hotel or condo hotel.
But by the time the project broke ground on Dec. 7, the projected investment had already swelled to $215 million. That was because almost all of the components had increased in size. The class A office building, planned primarily to accommodate university uses, has grown to about 127,000 square feet. Wake Forest will move several non-student-facing departments, such as advancement, finance, human resources and information systems, to the new office building.
Meanwhile, the retail village grew to about 42,000 square feet. Planned now are 25 for-sale lofts over the retail village. The residential portion is now slated to offer 229 units, offer 521 beds.
Adam Parker, vice president at Carter and a Winston-Salem native, told TBJ then that the increase was due to demand both from users and investors.
“[We’ve been] doing things like market studies and talking to retailers and prospective people who would live here,” he explained.
Front Street and Carter expect to complete the infrastructure work, office building and retail village by the end of summer 2026, with the multifamily housing community coming a year later. Timing of the hospitality component is to be determined.
The first hints of the project emerged in the summer 2023 as state legislators appropriated $35 million to support infrastructure improvements that could “reinforce Winston-Salem’s position as a tourism, sports and entertainment district.” That funding would in the spring be allocated to the city, to work with Front Street and Carter, to tackle significant infrastructure work aimed at making the mixed-used development conducive to moving pedestrians safely through the area. That work includes road widening and reconfiguring, greenways, pedestrian trails, plazas and underground utilities.
As Triad Business Journal unpacked as part of its Spotlight on Forsyth panel discussion in October, one significant infrastructure element is the narrowing of Deacon Boulevard down to a two-lane, tree-lined “main street” with sidewalks. The intent is for people to park outside the area and then roam about inside a high-density, pedestrian-friendly development chock full of retail and restaurant offerings.
The vision for the project has taken shape over a couple of years, as TBJ explored in a “behind the deal” cover story, but Wake Forest, as the owner of the land, has championed an ambitious use of the property for more than a decade. The university has been mapping out a concurrent capital improvement plan on its Reynolda campus expected to involve several hundred million dollars of investment.
One interesting element to watch and monitor as the project is built is how that ‘wow factor’ might influence the retail landscape. One thought that emerged from Triad Business Journal’s real estate panel in November was that The Grounds might attract out-of-market concepts that are currently having a hard time finding space in the Triad due to a lack of construction of significant new retail space.
By TBJ Staff