Ross Perot Jr. Has Big Plans For Smyrna Airport Business Park

SMYRNA, TN — The Rutherford County Industrial Development Board put its stamp of approval on a massive development project at the Smyrna Airport Monday.

Site prep work is already underway at the airport on the $45 million project which will contain two Class A office buildings combining for 924,325 square feet of office and warehouse space. It is being developed by Dallas-based Hillwood, the real estate empire led by Ross Perot Jr..

Even though the formal IDB approval — necessary because the land in question is co-owned by the county; Hillwood did not ask for and is not receiving any tax abatements — came just this week, work is already far enough along that Hillwood predicts a spring 2017 completion date.

The Daily News Journal reports Hillwood is eyeing the expansion into the Nashville market as one of its prime targets among so-called 18-hour cities. Real estate investors have been heavily drawn to these second-tier cities — the sobriquet comes from the idea of a place like New York or Chicago being 24-hour cities, where as smaller cities only have amenities that operate during business hours; 18-hour cities fall in between — because they offer amenities similar to larger cities but with much lower costs.

“Population growth and logistics are among the many reasons that 18-hour cities are emerging as big investment opportunities. This property marks our expansion and continued investment in the Nashville market,” Hillwood's senior vice president and mid-south region market leader Kurt Nelson said, according to the newspaper.

There is a 20-year master-plan for the Smyrna Airport, which began life in 1941 as Sewart Air Force Base which closed and became a civilian airport as part of a general military drawdown in 1971, includes widespread development which is underway with a variety of mixed-use projects and the huge Hillwood play.