Ramrock Nears Approval On Two-Tower Preston Center Dev

Ramrock Real Estate is ready to go big in Preston Center.

The Dallas investor scored a key rezoning that brings it one step closer to building two towers in the southern section of the 103-acre Preston Center district of North Dallas, the Dallas Morning News reported. The firm plans two buildings, one residential and one office.

The residential portion of the development would feature 180 apartments, while the office would bring 265,000 square feet of workspace. The project plans also entail 40,000 square feet of retail. The development site is bordered by Berkshire Lane, Westchester Drive, Luther Lane and Douglas Avenue.

Ramrock’s Robert Dozier said the neighborhood plan suggests a future similar to the city’s West Village, a dense portion of Uptown with shops and apartments. He has been acquiring land in the area since 2002, more than a decade before the city began generating its Northwest Highway/Preston Road Area Plan, which laid out its vision for the neighborhood’s growth.

“They were really encouraging all property owners in there to densify their sites. They wanted to see ground-floor retail. They wanted to see multifamily and office as a mixed-use component,” Dozier told the outlet.

Since the project faced community feedback in March, it has been slightly altered. Now, it will include a 30,000-square-foot landscaped rooftop, and its parking will open to retail customers after office hours.

The project was designed by architect HKS.

While it has secured approval from the Dallas City Plan Commission, the rezoning still needs the nod from Dallas City Council.

Nearby, other projects are aimed at increasing density in the neighborhood. Across Luther Lane, at the site that currently consists of a Hopdoddy and medical office, developers are looking to build two towers, each over 300 feet tall.

Rosebriar Holdings and Burk Interests told the DMN in 2020 that they planned a 240-key hotel with 54 condos on top and an apartment building for the sites.

Preston Center has just about 4.4 million square feet of office inventory, and it had 12.3 percent vacancy in the first quarter, one of the lowest rates in the city, according to Cushman & Wakefield. Uptown/Turtle Creek, the city’s hottest submarket for office development, has about 4.8 million square feet of inventory but a vacancy rate of 21.8 percent.