New Developments on The Horizon (Week 1)

The Campus at Horton

The former Horton Plaza Mall will be transformed into an exciting, multi-use campus. Spanning across 7 city blocks and 10 acres, this will be the largest reuse project in the U.S., including 1 million square feet.

The Campus at Horton will feature amenities like diverse dining, retail stores, cultural venues, wellness spots, and more. It will include 2,200 parking spaces with on-site parking, valet services, and EV charging stations. 

The campus will have 9 buildings with 772,000 sf of modern office space and 300,000 sf of ground-level retail space. Additional features will be a campus walkway, park, life science offices, and lab spaces. 

The campus aims to be net zero carbon through 2040. The campus will achieve this by maximizing its space and reusing existing structures and materials. This has led to a 60% reduction in embodied carbon footprint. Solar panels will cover the 10-acre campus which will be fantastic for future tenants as this will decrease energy costs. Lastly, the campus will use 100% outside air for cooling and save 7.5 million gallons of water annually by reusing it. 

The project is being completed in phases, with the entire development expected to be finished in 2027.

Key Takeaways

The Campus at Horton highlights a creative approach to urban redevelopment in San Diego. The extensive on-site amenities will cause increased foot traffic and add new life to a location that was overdue for change. Horton Plaza Mall was an outdated, five-level shopping center built in 1985. Stockdale Capital Partners purchased the property for $175 million in 2018 and received city approval about a year later to begin redevelopment.

Eco-friendly developments like this have become increasingly popular. It will be interesting to see which tenants choose to lease the modern office and lab spaces and if this will attract more tech and life science companies to Downtown San Diego.

Additionally, this project may encourage other property owners and developers to think about similar renovations or adaptive reuse projects. One project that comes to mind is Fashion Valley Mall, which opened in 1969. The mall continues to attract major foot traffic and has undergone several renovations (in the 1980s and early 2000s), but it could benefit from a mixed-use development.