Marriott International Inc. has purchased 3.2 acres in Foothill Ranch for an undisclosed amount and plans to build a four-story, 156-room Courtyard by Marriott hotel on the land.
The hotel is set for the Foothill Plaza at Portola Parkway and the Foothill (241) toll road and will cater to the business community in the area, according to Dougall Agan, Foothill Ranch Co. vice president of marketing. Nearly 13 million square feet of office space is being developed within a 2.5-mile radius around the hotel site, Agan said. Already a Hampton Inn sits within Foothill Ranch, with an Extended Stay America just over the border in Lake Forest. A Hilton Garden Inn is expected to go up soon, adjacent to the Hampton Inn. The addition of the Courtyard by Marriott will bring the total hotel space in the area to nearly 400 rooms.
“We have lots of employers in the area who are putting more and more pressure on visitations,” Agan said. “And Courtyard is more of a business-class hotel than Extended Stay and Hampton Inn.”
Agan named Oakley Inc., Nike Inc., Pacific Life Insurance Co. and the University of Phoenix as a few of the larger businesses in the area that bring in employees or customers in need of a place to meet or stay overnight. The Foothill Ranch hotel is set to feature high-speed modem access, printing, copying and fax service, a work station in each room and meeting space.
With nearly 2,100 lodging properties, Bethesda, Md.-based Marriott is one of Orange County’s largest employers with more than 5,000 employees at its local hotels.
Construction on the Courtyard project is set to begin in the fall, with completion scheduled for spring 2002, Agan said. Courtyard by Marriott has six locations in Orange County and more than 500 worldwide.
The Courtyard is being built within the larger 15-acre Foothill Plaza office-retail development.
“It’s one of the last areas to be developed in Foothill Ranch,” said Cameron Crowner of CB Richard Ellis’ Anaheim office. Crowner, along with Jim Duke, also of CB, represented the Foothill Ranch Co. in the land sale. Chris Frederick of Commercial West represented Marriott.
“Originally, we looked at the land for a big box, but when the office market came back in the mid-’90s, there was a demand for mixed-use space,” Crowner said.
A pair of three-story buildings totaling 200,000 square feet will anchor Foothill Plaza. The Courtyard and two spots set aside for large restaurants will be built around the office space.
The Foothill Ranch Co. is in talks with potential tenants for the office space, which is under construction and will be ready later this year. The company also is trying to find the right tenants for the restaurant spots.
“Right now, we have a Chili’s, an Island’s and an Outback Steakhouse at Foothill, but we don’t have that exclusive tablecloth dinner house in the Saddleback Valley,” Crowner said. “We’re trying to procure more of a dinner house with a full-service bar, something that’s not even necessarily a chain.”
Foothill Ranch is a 2,743-acre masterplanned community northeast of the intersection of the San Diego (I-405) and Santa Ana (I-5) freeways. Foothill Ranch includes 3,900 homes with 13,000 residents, as well as 8.5 million square feet of office space. In 1998, Lake Forest annexed the Foothill Ranch Towne Centre & Marketplace.
Foothill Ranch is 90% built out, according to Agan. The residential component is completed and the commercial element is on schedule for completion in spring 2002. n
