Marble Falls commercial projects rising up

By Glynis Crawford Smith

The Highlander

At least three of the new commercial construction projects underway around Marble Falls are taking shape—the Pedernales Electric Cooperative (PEC) Northwest Operations Center, the new Bealls store and Chick-fil-A.

PEC held a ceremonial groundbreaking March 7, 2016 for the Co-op’s Northwest Operations Center at 4302 US 281, across the highway from Resource Parkway in Marble Falls. The center, expected to open Summer 2017, was conceived after an extensive facilities study and research into growth trends throughout PEC’s service territory.

The $15 million project includes an 18,000-square-foot, two-story building in a total 27,000-square-foot facility. The central architectural feature, a massive arched roof has been taking shape at the hands of steel workers.

Beyond its replacement of the existing PEC office, the new building is to be come a center for materials and training. One of its unique features is to be an electric vehicle fueling station.

The new Bealls at 1400 Ranch to Market Road 1431 is scheduled for an April opening. The $5.2 million project includes within 45,000 square feet, two additional 5,000-square-foot retail tenant spaces near the intersection of Avenue N and Ninth Street, across from Ford & Crew Home & Hardware.

The construction project has been estimated at $5.2 million.

The move of the department store to the new home on the south side of the highway should signal the beginning of a project that will see the old store gone and a new H-E-B, perhaps on the scale of the store now in Lakeway. That reality would lie at the end of land engineering research and a year-long store design process, the San Antonio-based company has said, but it has set Marble Falls shoppers dreaming.

Bealls of Marble Falls is part of the Houston-based, 855-store chain, Stage Stores, Inc., unaffiliated with the 500 stores of the Bealls of Florida that include Burkes Outlet.

Chick-fil-A displays a promising sign at 2105 US 281. Begun in November, the fast food chain outlet could be complete by May, on track for a summer opening, according to progress through city permit process.

It will be one of more than 2,000 restaurants in Atlanta, Georgia-based Chick-fil-A, Inc., founded by S. Truett Cathy, who died in 2014 at age 93, a philantrophist and motivational writer. His books included, his autobiography, “Eat Mor Chikin: Inspire More People.”