Hair Salon near Nexton, SC

SUMMERVILLE — After years of traffic concerns, the town is getting started on a $21 million road project to improve Maple Street.

The road runs from West Richardson Avenue downtown to Nexton Parkway. The project includes widening Maple Street from two to four lanes just east of Shamrock Drive to West Richardson Avenue; adding turn lanes at all approaches to U.S. Highway 78; installing a traffic signal at West Richardson Avenue; and adding a new alignment from West Richardson to Parsons Road, where it will transition from three lanes to two lanes at the Parsons Road connection.

Even mid-morning traffic on Maple Street is notable; it becomes easily congested due to it being a two-way street. If one car needs to turn left, several cars will be held up waiting for the vehicle to turn.

The Maple Street extension has been in the works since 2015 and is one of many road projects the Dorchester County 1 percent sales tax will fund. The tax, which voters elected to continue last year, began in 2004 and has paid for improvements to several roads such as Bacons Bridge Road, S.C. Highway 27 and Patriots Boulevard.

The town of Summerville and Dorchester County are partnering on the project.

Officials said the project will help alleviate congestion in a town beset by traffic concerns as its population has exploded in recent years.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the town’s population has jumped from 27,752 in 2000 to 50,915 in 2020. The Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments projects the 2030 population to exceed 97,000.

“The Maple Street Extension Project will help alleviate traffic congestion and improve safety,” Mayor Ricky Waring said. “I am grateful for the support from our agency partners and the Dorchester County voters who supported the transportation sales tax referendum that helped fund this project.”

Up to $11 million of the project — including construction and engineering/inspection — will be funded by the town’s midtown tax increment finance district funds. Dorchester County sales tax referendum funds will cover the rest, totaling the construction costs to just under $21 million and engineering costs around $1.2 million.

“This project will be one of the first opportunities the county has to utilize funds made available to us through the continuation of the Transportation Sales Tax,” Dorchester County Council Chairman Todd Friddle said. “The Maple Street Extension Project is a great example of what can be accomplished when we collaborate to improve our community, and we look forward to working together again on future projects.”

Construction will start in April or May, with the goal of completion by spring 2025.

OMNI INDUSTRIAL CAMPUS EYES JUNE FOR COMPLETION DATE

BERKELEY COUNTY, S.C., March 6, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- The final development lot within the Omni Industrial Campus is set to deliver 1.33 million square feet in June of this year, filling out one of the most prominent and successful industrial parks in the Charleston region. Developed by a partnership between Clarius Partners and Stonemont Financial Group, leased by Bridge Commercial, the three-building project located on the 100 acre Lot 1 of the park will offer tenants occupancy ready, state-of-the-art, best in class, modern distribution and or manufacturing space.

With the initial building, Building 2, pre-leased to a long term build to suit user, the remaining two buildings, Buildings 3 and 4, (totaling ±971,000 square feet) are being developed speculatively and are available for lease. Both buildings feature 36' clear heights, ESFR sprinkler systems, LED warehouse lighting to 30 fc throughout and a full complement of 40,000 lbs. capacity loading dock positions. These buildings will also feature speculative office space to allow for immediate occupancy in June of 2023.

Building 4, at ±607,000 SF, is a cross dock building targeted to accommodate high volume distribution needs with ample trailer storage on site. Building 3, at ±365,000 SF, provides an alternate front park, rear load configuration, designed to attract a variety of smaller tenant spaces,100,000 SF and above. Supplemental circulation/driveways provide multiple or separate access points between the two buildings benefitting both single tenant or multi-tenant occupancies. These two buildings will offer solutions to a wide range of user types and sizes, all benefitting from Omni Industrial Campus' immediate proximity to the both the Jedbug Road and Nexton Parkway interchanges on I-26. Further, Tenants choosing to locate at the Omni Industrial Campus will enjoy competitive and consistent operating expenses, thanks in large part to a pre-negotiated FILOT agreement in place with Berkely County.

This announcement comes on the heels of a record-breaking year for the South Carolina Ports, handling nearly 2.8 million TEU's at the Port of in 2022, positioning it as one of the top ports for cargo volume along the East and Gulf Coasts. Together with explosive growth in the greater area this makes Omni Industrial Campus a prime location for companies looking to expand their operations for either distribution or manufacturing uses.

For more information or media inquiries, please contact with Pearl Public Relations at .

Bridge Commercial is a regionally focused commercial real estate firm headquartered in . Our brokers are best in class and known nationally for their experience and expertise. We offer a variety of services including tenant representation, owner representation, investment sales, strategic planning, site selection, and consulting services.

Stonemont Financial Group specializes in investing across a broad spectrum of real estate asset classes and geographies to deliver attractive risk-adjusted returns. Stonemont offers diversified and differentiated real estate investment strategies and vehicles to institutions, family offices, trusts and high net-worth individuals. The firm's founders and managing principals have a combined track record of more than 60 years' experience and invested.

Clarius is a full-service real estate investment and development company managing select, Class-A industrial, cold storage, hospital, medical office, corporate office and land development investments on behalf of the principals of Clarius as well as third-party real estate investors and owners. Clarius' completed and ongoing projects total over 16 million square feet of ground-up development delivered in multiple markets across . Through its deep industry knowledge and extensive network, Clarius Partners aspires to deliver exceptional development results with quality, clarity and integrity.

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The company that’s building out a master-planned community in Berkeley County that’s as large as the Charleston peninsula is set to come under new ownership.

California-based Brookfield Residential announced this week that it is acquiring Newland, the developer of the 5,000-acre mixed-use Nexton neighborhood between Interstate 26 and U.S. Highway 176 near Summerville.

The sale of San Diego-based Newland, which is involved in 20 large master-planned projects around the country, is expected to be finalized June 1.

Financial terms were not disclosed.

A Nexton spokeswoman declined to comment on the pending sale.

“No major, significant operational changes are expected,” said Brookfield spokeswoman Krista Ellingson.

She said the company’s specialty is supplying homes and lots in constrained real estate markets such as Charleston, where a scarcity of homes on the market has dropped to less than a one-month supply, triggering bidding wars and pushing up prices.

“We just aren’t a homebuilder, we invest in land to build homes and sell to homebuilders,” Ellingson said. “We want to show our partners that we are in it with them.”

Bob McLeod, Newland’s executive chairman, said the Brookfield deal “will provide more opportunities for the continued development of additional mixed-use masterplans well into the future as well as give us significant additional vertical development opportunities.”

As of this week, Nexton has 1,266 occupied single-family homes in four subdivisions — Brighton Park, Del Webb, Midtown and North Creek. About 200 more are under development within the neighborhoods.

Nexton also has about 900 finished apartments in three complexes, with another 600 rental units on the way.

When build-out is completed in about 10 years, Nexton will have about 7,000 residences with about 17,500 residents. That will make it roughly equal to the current populations of Moncks Corner and Georgetown combined.

Brookfield Residential currently has no real estate operations in the Palmetto State. The Newland acquisition will expand its footprint to eight new markets, including Charleston, Raleigh-Durham and Wilmington in the Carolinas, and five other areas where both companies have projects in the works.

Last year, Brookfield’s revenue from home and land sales was $1.74 billion, about $200 million less than in 2019, mainly because of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the company’s annual report.

During the first three months of 2021, total revenue topped $444 million, about 30 percent more than the first quarter last year, when the coronavirus began to spread throughout the overall economy.

Costa Mesa, Calif.-based Brookfield Residential is part of Canada’s Brookfield Asset Management, which oversees investment totaling $600 billion and is headquartered in Toronto.

Newland oversees the development of the Nexton tract for North America Sekisui House LLC. NASH, a subsidiary of Japan’s largest homebuilder, bought the property in 2017 from paper maker WestRock Co.’s former real estate division for $90 million.

The Page family (Tony, Ashleigh, Courtney, and Chase) took the slow and steady route to culinary greatness, launching their restaurant in a smallish space on Mount Pleasant's Coleman Boulevard in 2006 and moving to a larger building down the street five years later. Now, long after Page's Okra Grill was established as one of the most popular eateries in the Lowcountry, its owners are about to take their recipe for success into other parts of the tri-county area and other aspects of the dining industry.

Although Page's already operates food trucks in Nexton and Moncks Corner; the restaurant will soon add catering to its repertoire, and, before long, another Page's Okra Grill will open its doors in Nexton.

"We always wanted to get into catering, but we wanted to wait for the right time so we could do it right - up to Okra Grill's standards," says Chase Page, the founders' brother and currently the operations manager for the two mobile units. "Great food, great value and great service. We feel like we can take everything we have learned over the years and provide great catering for our community - weddings, corporate events, sit-down catering, buffets, office lunches, private food truck events, and family dinners. We are excited to meet new folks and provide great food for them but also to serve our same loyal regulars, just in a different way."

The new 10,000-square-foot restaurant, to be built where the Nexton food truck currently does business at 142 Brighton Park Blvd, will include a large catering kitchen and private dining areas. It is expected to start serving customers sometime in the 2023 calendar year. Until then, the catering business will operate out of the Mount Pleasant location, with a menu offering many of the same dishes that have propelled Page's to the top of many of the area's "Best Of" lists, including Ashleigh's iconic Shrimp & Grits.

Chase says catering customers can expect "some surprising items" as well.

The Nexton version of Page's Okra Grill and the catering business will mirror the traditions that have been a hallmark of the restaurant for nearly 17 years.

"One of the most important things in the business is culture - the way you treat your staff and customers. It's totally separates from your processes. We kind of captured lightning in a bottle at Coleman," Chase points out. "Part of that is the quirky personalities of everybody involved. When our family started Okra Grill, it grew like wildfire, and we had to learn the hard way how to run a restaurant. It's all about the little things we like to do to make staff and guests feel like family."

Chase says he hopes the new restaurant will take some of the pressure off the Coleman Boulevard location. Page's Okra Grill in Mount Pleasant has become so popular, there are times when customers must wait for an extended period of time to be seated. Next year, Lowcountry residents will have the option to enjoy Page's Okra Grill's food and hospitality at either of the two locations.

With both the catering business and the new restaurant, Page's Okra Grill follow the same business model that has been proven so successful since 2006.

"We'll do it the way we've always done it," Chase explains. "Slow and steady. We don't want to lose any of the magic we've built up over the years."

To learn more about one of the Lowcountry's most popular restaurants, visit www.pagesokragrill.com.

Contributing Writer

The local master planned community named the best in the nation has begun work on another phase, on the way to 7,500 residences. This new phase of the Nexton community in Summerville and Berkeley County is expected to add apartments for rent, hotel, office space and 150,000 square feet of shopping and dining space when it is completely built out over the next five to seven years.

Nexton has sold nearly 24 acres to Charlotte-based Crosland Southeast, which plans to develop the new One Nexton segment in multiple phases, starting this coming summer. The first phase of One Nexton will include 351 new apartments and 37,500 square feet of retail space anchored by a Publix supermarket.

One Nexton is consistent with the mixed-use development philosophy of the larger Nexton community, which sits between Interstate 26 and U.S. Highway 176 and was named the “Master-Planned Community of the Year” in 2021 by the National Association of Homebuilders.

Nexton sold 456 homes in 2020 and another 576 in 2021 to earn a spot on the RCLCO Real Estate Advisors list of fastest-growing planned communities. More than 1,800 homes currently comprise greater Nexton, including 250 under construction.

Located at the northeast corner of Brighton Park Boulevard and Nexton Parkway, the first phase of One Nexton will break ground in the summer and is expected to be complete in the fall of 2024.

“One Nexton illustrates that Nexton continues to be a national leader in modern community design,” said Brent Gibadlo, vice president and general manager of Nexton. “By fostering thoughtful commercial and residential growth along Charleston’s I-26 growth corridor, we can provide everything our residents want and need while cutting down on commute times and improving quality of life by allowing them to live, work and play and shop all within a short walk or drive from their homes.”

One Nexton will include green space, parks and trails that connect to the rest of Nexton. The master plan for the entire Nexton development calls for 50 miles of walking/biking trails; 2,000 of the total 5,000 acres set aside for woodlands, wetlands and open space; and 400 acres of office, commercial and retail.

One Nexton is the latest phase of the community, built one section at a time over the past decade. Originally developed by WestRock, the real estate company that was formed from lumber giant MeadWestvaco. Today, the development is under development by Brookfield Residential, which acquired the previous developer, Newland, last year.

Nexton’s previous phase to begin development was Midtown, five districts built around a central area of shops, restaurants and a wellness center complete with tennis center, lap pool, yoga studio and more. That followed on the heels last year of Downtown Nexton, 100 acres between Sigma Drive and Brighton Park offering the same amenities and walkability.