Amazon inks massive lease at Melrose Park distribution center

The e-commerce giant has taken space at more than 20 warehouse facilities in the Chicago area and statewide over the past 4 years

Jeff Bezos with the former Maywood Park harness racing track in Melrose Park. Amazon will lease the nearly-completed distribution center there, called Chariot Logistics Center. (Credit: Getty Images, Cushman & Wakefield, and iStock)
Jeff Bezos with the former Maywood Park harness racing track in Melrose Park. Amazon will lease the nearly-completed distribution center there, called Chariot Logistics Center. (Credit: Getty Images, Cushman & Wakefield, and iStock)

Amazon is moving into a nearly-completed three-building warehouse development in Melrose Park, the latest addition to its enormous distribution center portfolio nationwide.

The e-commerce behemoth will lease all of the 623,000 square feet at Chariot Logistics Center, at 1800-1825 North 5th Avenue, according to the Chicago Tribune. The site had been Maywood Park harness racing track until it closed in 2015.

Amazon already leases nearly 154 million square feet of industrial space throughout the country, compared to just 4 million square feet of property that it owns.

In the past four years, Amazon has inked deals for more than 20 warehouse facilities in the Chicago area and statewide. Amazon’s largest warehouse in the area is a 1 million-square-foot facility in Aurora; in September, it inked a lease for 237,000 square feet at a distribution center in Skokie.

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Atlanta-based Ridgeline Property Group is building the 40-acre Chariot Logistics Center development. It’s expected to be completed by month’s end.

Larry Goldwasser, a Cushman & Wakefield broker who handled leasing for Ridgeline, confirmed all of the space has been taken by a single tenant but declined to name the company, according to the Tribune.

Another developer, Chicago-based GW Properties, is planning 16 acres of retail, including shops and restaurants, on the northern edge of the former racetrack. [Tribune]Brianna Kelly