Sharp Center
New retail needed for growing Denton, Texas, culminates with Rayzor Ranch.
Randall Shearin

Overview of Rayzor Ranch, Denton, Texas.

It’s a tract that’s had merchants and developers salivating for years: a prime, undeveloped 412-acre mixed-use parcel at the apex of the booming North Texas region along one of the country’s busiest highways, all in the center of a highly desirable trade population of 400,000.

For decades, the former ranchland in Denton, Texas, sat largely fallow. Its civically conscious owners, the Rayzor family, refused to yield to buyers who didn’t have the highest and best uses in mind for the coveted land, which is a half-mile north of the point where heavily traveled Interstates 35E and 35W rejoin to again form I-35.

In April 2006 Dallas-based Allegiance Development and Austin-based equity provider Torreón Capital teamed to buy the parcel at University Drive (Highway 380) and I-35 to create an $850 million mixed-use village that will produce the kind of high-profile anchors, specialty shops and other amenities that locals have long desired.

Retail development at the master-planned Rayzor Ranch complex will include a 1 million-square-foot open-air super regional shopping center called Rayzor Ranch Town Center that will feature fashion department stores, specialty stores, a 16-screen theater, 23,000-square-foot bookstore and several prominent national and regional restaurants. A separate but thematically consistent 800,000-square-foot power center, Rayzor Ranch MarketPlace, will be anchored by Sam’s Club and Wal-Mart SuperCenter and include several other national and regional retailers on the north side of Rayzor tract, which is divided by Highway 380.

Retail development at the master-planned Rayzor Ranch complex will include a 1 million-square-foot open-air super regionalshopping center called Rayzor Ranch Town Center that will feature department stores, specialty stores, a 16-screen theater, bookstore and national and regional restaurants.

The development site is 32 miles northwest of Dallas, 31 miles west of McKinney and 21 miles northeast of Fort Worth in a trade area called the Golden Triangle, directly in the growth path of Dallas-Fort Worth. Presently, shoppers in the trade area must drive as long as an hour to find new-generation town centers and most national lifestyle and fashion retailers, says Randy Holcombe, executive vice president of Allegiance. There is a tremendous void in this market for “upper moderate to better” merchandising as evidenced by leakage to both Stonebriar Center and Northpark Mall, Holcombe says.

Holcombe said the retail and residential presentation at the New Urbanism-style town center will be comparable to that planned by General Growth Properties at Summerlin Town Center just outside of Las Vegas.

Joining the Rayzor Ranch mix will be a 68-acre residential complex featuring single-family homes, town homes, condos, an active-adult living campus and continuing-care retirement center, plus an upscale apartment community. A 10-story, full-service hotel plus 20 acres of medical facilities and Class A offices will add to the lineup.

Green spaces and community amenities will also abound. There will be over 25 acres of public parks at Rayzor Ranch with walking trails and park-style promenades as well as wide tree-lined streets, fountains and other water features, two museums and a 90,000-square-foot convention and visitor center.

Doug Elliott, grandson of ranch founder J. Newton Rayzor, will assist in cultural recruitment and oversight of the museum development, says C. Joseph Gampper, president of Allegiance. “It was clear that the family is looking at this as part of their legacy to the city of Denton,” says Gampper. “So they had to be 100 percent sure it was of the highest possible quality.”

Shoppers from the entire region are expected to patronize Rayzor Ranch. And, two large colleges with a combined enrollment of 44,000, the University of North Texas and Texas Woman’s University, are located within a 5-minute drive of the site and should provide a built-in employment base and auxiliary customer base, say Allegiance officials.

The retail components of Rayzor Ranch will open between late 2008 and early 2009 followed by the balance of the development. The new Denton Presbyterian Hospital that’s already adjacent to the Rayzor property is expected to provide synergy for new medical business and for the planned senior campus, which will include both independent living and specialized care healthcare facilities.

There will be over 25 acres of public parks at Rayzor Ranch with walking trails and park-style promenades as well as wide tree-lined streets, fountains and other water features.

Rex Paine, partner and co-founder of Torreón Capital, says the Denton market is especially intriguing because it combines an established community with significant new outlying growth. Denton itself, which boasted a 2005 average household income of $75,194, has increased its population from 80,000 in 2001 to its current 100,000, while Denton County ranks among the nation’s top 10 counties for highest median household income adjusted for cost of living.

Rayzor Ranch will deliver several firsts to the Denton market. It will be the first town center development in the city. The planned 200-room hotel would be Denton’s first full-service hotel. The Sam’s Club will also be a first in town as will several of the soon-to-be-named national lifestyle tenants and restaurants that will occupy the center.

What made the Rayzor property such a compelling investment, says Paine, was not only its location, but also its status as one of only a few large undeveloped retail tracts remaining in the North Texas area. Typically, such well-placed properties in the path of progress have been divided and developed long ago.

“To get more than 400 acres of this type of land in one place is indeed a real rarity,” says Allegiance’s Gampper. “It’s like having a blank canvas filled with all kinds of possibilities.” Putting together a detailed site plan that was acceptable to the city, family, developer and lender in what was just a 4-month period prior to closing was also extraordinary, he adds. “The end result will be one of the best mixed-use developments in the U.S.”


©2007 France Publications, Inc. Duplication or reproduction of this article not permitted without authorization from France Publications, Inc. For information on reprints of this article contact Barbara Sherer at (630) 554-6054.