What You Need to Know About Getting Building Permits for a Lifestyle Center

As the concept of lifestyle centers continues to grow and expand, developers are faced with designing and building these spaces from the ground up. While smaller centers may have been able to get away with leasing existing buildings or renovating warehouses in the past, larger projects require something new. Planning, permitting, and constructing a new lifestyle center presents its own set of challenges. Redeveloping an existing site or constructing a new one requires a different approach than working with existing buildings. Read on to learn more about getting permits for a lifestyle center.

What is a Lifestyle Center?

A lifestyle center is a retail center with a mix of uses and a focus on customer experience. The majority of shoppers visit lifestyle centers during weekends, evenings, and holidays, making them appealing to retailers who are looking to target a more discretionary spending audience. Lifestyle centers are designed to be easy to navigate and incorporate indoor/outdoor spaces for the center to blend with the surrounding area. Lifestyle centers range in size from a few hundred thousand square feet to over 2 million square feet. Since lifestyle centers have a variety of tenants, tenants share common areas, like parking lots, sidewalks, and entrances. Lifestyle centers generate significant amounts of foot traffic and boast higher sales per square foot than traditional enclosed malls.

The Process of Getting Building Permits for a Lifestyle Center

Lifestyle centers are a complex project that requires careful planning and timing to get everything approved and completed in time to open the doors to customers. The process of getting building permits for a lifestyle center is broken down into three phases: pre-permit, pre-construction, and construction. Depending on the size and scope of your project, the timeline for these phases can range from 6 months to 2 years. The pre-permit phase is the time when you’re looking at potential locations and identifying potential tenants. This will likely take several months as you’re researching properties and talking to real estate and commercial brokers. Once you’ve found a potential location and have signed a lease, you can move onto the pre-construction phase. The pre-construction phase is when you’re designing and getting permits for the project. You’ll work with engineers and architects to design the site and get permits for everything from the structural design to the landscaping and stormwater management. The construction phase is self-explanatory. Once you have the permits in place, you can begin building. Depending on the complexity of your lifestyle center, the total timeline for getting building permits for a lifestyle center will range from 18 months to 2 years.

Location and Lot Selection

The first step in getting building permits for a lifestyle center is finding the right location. Location is critical to the success of any retail project. The location you choose will impact the types of tenants you’re able to attract and how many customers you’ll be able to draw to your center. Deciding between build-to-suit and build-to-sell Lots are typically available in one of two ways: build-to-suit or build-to-sell. Build-to-suit lots are usually reserved for big-box retailers, like Home Depot or Costco. The owner of the lot will build the project to the specific retailer’s specifications and requirements. Some lifestyle center development projects will offer build-to-sell lots. This means that the developer will build the site to a general set of specifications and the developer will sell the site to a retailer.

Structural and Architectural Requirements

Lifestyle centers need to be designed with the customer experience from the ground up. A major factor in creating an attractive customer experience is the architectural design. The architectural design of your building will contribute to the aesthetics of your center, so it’s important to make sure you have the right architects and design team in place. You’ll need to make sure your building complies with local building codes, including architectural and structural requirements. Some of these requirements will likely include: – The location of the entrances and exits – The size of the parking lots – The amount of water your landscape design uses – The amount of impervious surfaces your site uses In order to comply with architectural requirements, you’ll need to hire an architectural firm to design your project. The architectural design process will include: – Studying the site to understand the surrounding area – Understanding the zoning and permitted uses – Identifying potential uses – Creating a schematic design – Creating a design development document

Environmental Reviews

Lifestyle centers often incorporate green building design elements like using recycled materials, energy-efficient buildings, and landscaping that uses rainwater harvesting. Green building design is an important part of the customer experience and can help attract the right tenants to lease space in your center. In order to get building permits for a lifestyle center, you’ll need to make sure the site complies with all environmental regulations, including stormwater management. You’ll need to hire a civil engineer to help design a stormwater management system that can handle the volume of water from rainfall, landscaping, and roof runoff. The engineer will also help you develop a maintenance plan to keep the system functioning properly.

ADA Requirements

Lifestyle centers are public places that are open to everyone. One part of the design process that isn’t often discussed is how the architectural design can help make the site more accessible for all people, including people with disabilities. Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires business owners to make reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities. Getting building permits for a lifestyle center includes completing an architectural review that includes ADA requirements. There are three steps to getting your project ready for the architectural review: – Identify areas of the site that are public and private. The architects will use this information to determine where the accessibility features need to be located. – Create a list of all the features of the site that will be accessible to people with disabilities. This could include features like entrances, parking lots, paths and walkways, interior features like restrooms, and other elements of the site that people with disabilities would need to access. – Create a plan of action for how you’re going to implement the accessibility features on the site. This plan of action should include the timeframe for when you’re going to complete each project and any cost estimates you have for the work.

Building Code Requirements

All building projects, including construction of lifestyle centers, must comply with local building codes. This is important because the building code is put in place to protect the public. Local building departments are responsible for enforcing these codes, including the codes for lifestyle centers. If your project doesn’t comply with local building codes, the building department will issue you a deficiency notice. Deficiency notices are often called “stop work orders” because they require you to stop all construction until the non-compliant portions of your project are brought up to code. Getting building permits for a lifestyle center means making sure your project complies with all code requirements. Some of the most common code requirements you’ll need to comply with include: – Project location and access – Fire protection – Electrical – Mechanical – Plumbing – Structural design – Stormwater management – Site grading – Parking lot design – Accessible features