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The city of Eagan is working to provide developers with a blueprint for reusing underutilized office sites around Eagan’s Central Park.
The Eagan City Council adopted last week its Northwest Central Commons Small Area Plan, which outlines the city’s vision for the development of 80 acres of surrounding its Central Park and Eagan Community Center.
The area comprises the former headquarters campus of Northwest Airlines (later acquired by Delta Air Lines), the former Argosy University campus and Unisys Corp.’s data center campus. All of the sites are either vacant or soon to be vacant.
The area is also located near Eagan’s Central Park Commons, a shopping center anchored by Hy-Vee Inc., Hobby Lobby, Total Wine & More and Sierra Trading Post at the intersection of Yankee Doodle Road and Pilot Knob Road.
“The point of this is so ... buyers and developers are really able to see what the city's vision is and can get a fairly good idea of what they could propose and what is approvable from the city's perspective,” said Jill Hutmacher, the city’s community development director.
The city considers its Central Park and Community Center area as one of its largest, most important and most complicated, according to the small plan area’s executive summary.
Eagan’s main growth as a suburban community happened alongside the growth of corporate campuses in the second half of the 20th century, the summary says. But times have changed, accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic, creating a decreased need for office space.
“Unlike smaller sites throughout the City, the 80 acres surrounding the Central Park will not develop to its potential without a coordinated plan that considers the needs of both public and private interests,” the summary says.
Efforts to create a small-area plan began in mid-2022. Now adopted, the plan will still need to go through a public hearing process and a review with the Metropolitan Council.
What should go where?
One of the sites included in the plan is Unisys’ 32-acre data center campus, located at 3199 Pilot Knob Road. The Blue Bell, Pennsylvania-based technology company confirmed last fall that it plans to leave the site. It's being marketed for sale by Tom O’Brien, John Rausch and Ben Drew of Cushman & Wakefield.
The small-area plan calls for that site, which it calls Central Park East, to become an active, mixed-use area with restaurants, jobs and walkability. It notes that big-box retail, drive-thru fast-food restaurants and stand-alone industrial spaces are considered incompatible uses unless combined with a mixed-use structure, the plan says.
Another vacant site slated for redevelopment is the 39-acre former Delta campus, located at 1500 Towerview Road. O’Brien, Rausch and Drew are also marketing this property. The plan calls that site Central Park West and suggests it become a mix of medium- and high-density housing. It also looks to have an active edge along Central Park with walk-up residential units.
The last site is the former Argosy University campus, located at 1515 Central Parkway. The site includes an 84,000-square-foot building, which has been repositioned as a multitenant office building.
The small-area plan recommends maintaining office uses there while using its surface parking lot as overflow parking for community events in Central Park. It also notes that redevelopment of the surface lot is possible, but isn’t a near-term priority.
Minneapolis-based IAG Commercial Real Estate is marketing the former Argosy — now-office building — for lease. The first tenants will be moving in this summer, said President Jeff LaFavre, who is part owner of the property. A portion of the first floor and all the second- and third-floor spaces are still available.
Companies want to move into suburban areas with walkability, LaFavre said, but many office districts in the suburbs lack that environment. This area of Eagan offers that and he's "thrilled" to be part of its future, he said.
Apart from this small-area plan, other companies and developers are stepping in to reuse other Eagan office campuses.
That includes the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota site, which was proposed to become a new headquarters for Johnson Bros. Liquor Co. before the St. Paul-based wine and spirits distributor pulled out of the deal.
Another site is 179 acres of the Thomson Reuters campus, which Minneapolis-based Ryan Cos. US Inc. intends to purchase and redevelop.
