Moncks Corner center planned

New subdivision to include stores

Like many new neighborhoods popping up around the region, a Moncks Corner community now under development will have its own "town center," complete with a grocery store and other shops.

Developers hope Foxbank Towne Center will serve as the commercial hub for Foxbank Plantation, a master-planned community at U.S. Highway 52 and Cypress Gardens Road that will contain more than 2,400 homes and a new elementary and middle school once complete. Home construction is already under way in the community, where prices will range from about $120,000 to $450,000.

Construction of the first section of the retail center, including a supermarket, is expected to start in January and should wrap up by late 2008, said Chelsea Sellars, marketing coordinator for the developer and property manager, Twin Rivers Capital LLC of Charleston. The entire center should be finished by 2011, she said.

Spanning more than 40 acres, the complex will house roughly 500,000 square feet of retail and office space, making it about the same size as Mount Pleasant Towne Centre. Plans call for a grocery store, a drug store, a bank, several restaurants, a gas station, and other businesses.

Negotiations are under way with a number of national and local tenants, but Sellars declined to give specific names until leases have been signed.

The center also will include green spaces for public gatherings, as well as a lake with fountains, she said.

Developers are increasingly including shopping areas in new housing developments as an added convenience for residents, Sellars said.

"Everything's just right there at your fingertips," she said.

Having a grocery store and other services nearby also will help residents cut down on car trips and save gas, she said, noting that the commercial areas of Goose Creek and Moncks Corner are both several miles away.

With that in mind, the developers hope the center will attract people from neighboring communities as well, Sellars said.

The Foxbank development is in a fast-growing section of Berkeley County where thousands of new homes are planned. Among the largest projects in the works are the Cane Bay and Parks of Berkeley neighborhoods, which combined, will include about 20,000 homes, as well as their own retail centers.

Real estate expert Bill Harrison said it makes sense to build shopping areas in such growth hot spots, even when many of the planned homes haven't been built yet.

Companies that are willing to stake a claim in a growing region's "pioneering fringe" can reap benefits in the long-run, said Harrison, a real-estate developer and lecturer for the University of South Carolina's Moore School of Business. "If you do a good job, you will control (the market) when the growth meets you," he said.

That said, retailers must be financially prepared to weather a period of losses "until the rooftops show up," he said.

The area around the Foxbank development already has attracted several large, nonretail employers, including technology firm Google, which is building a data center near Goose Creek. Trident Health Systems and Roper St. Francis Healthcare also are planning to build medical facilities in the vicinity.

Reach Caroline Fossi at 937-5524 or cfossi@postandcourier.com.