Developer Buys 422 Acres for Logistics Near McKinney Airport

A Dallas developer is betting big on McKinney’s airport boom with a 461-acre industrial project. But the proposal landed in the middle of a brewing political storm.

Holley Development Company acquired 422 acres in McKinney, north of the city’s planned commercial airport terminal, in what the firm called “one of the region’s most significant land deals this year,” the Dallas Morning News reported.

The purchase, combined with a previously acquired 39-acre site, brings Holley’s landholding near McKinney National Airport to 461 acres, all within range of the city’s ongoing $70 million airport expansion. The land, bought from local families, sits near County Road 722. Holley Development will seek rezoning from agricultural use to support light industrial and tech manufacturing projects.

“We bought at a great value relative to the market given the size of the tract,” company founder Stephen Holley told the outlet. “You can’t find industrial dirt in Richardson, Plano, Allen, and you can’t find anything of this scale in McKinney unless you go way off the freeway.”

Holley, a former Stillwater Capital executive, launched the firm last year. The McKinney purchase marks the firm’s first large-scale project. Holley credited the city’s airport growth strategy as a long-term driver for the area’s industrial potential.

McKinney plans to start construction on its passenger terminal this summer and has pitched the project as a future alternative to Dallas Love Field and DFW International. But the airport’s expansion and eastward sprawl has not been without controversy.

Residents in neighboring Fairview have pushed back, citing environmental concerns and a lack of voter support for related bond funding. A conservation group filed a federal lawsuit challenging the expansion, arguing the state’s “seriously flawed” environmental review failed to account for impacts on nearby neighborhoods and the Heard Wildlife Sanctuary.

The land will need reclamation work. Holley said 190 acres west of Spur 399 is developable as-is and could accommodate about 2.3 million square feet of commercial space. The Texas Department of Transportation recently started construction on the Spur 399 expansion, which will run through the site.

— Judah Duke