Outlet Mall in Ohio Near Cleveland

CLEVELAND, Ohio - An outlet-mall developer has its eye on lakefront land in downtown Cleveland, near Burke Lakefront Airport and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum.

Horizon Group Properties, Inc., is floating plans for a 350, 000-square-foot, multi-story retail center on a city-owned parking lot south and west of Burke. The Geis Cos. of Streetsboro has been marketing the 20-acre site for the past few years, as part of a broader public-private push to remake the downtown lakefront with new buildings, attractions and public spaces.

Home to roughly 14, 000 residents and close to 100, 000 workers, downtown Cleveland is once again on retailers' radar after decades of shopping stagnation. Recent additions, from the Heinen's grocery store on East Ninth Street to local furniture and outdoor-goods purveyors, cater to the center city's growing residential population.

Those stores aren't necessarily going to lure shoppers from the suburbs. Outlets, on the other hand, would be a destination.

Since at least 2009, consultants and retail experts have talked about high-end outlet stores as a potential path to making downtown a shopping mecca - something the city hasn't been for decades.

A proposal to fill empty storefronts along Euclid Avenue and at the Avenue at Tower City with discount versions of national chains and bargain-focused spinoffs of department stores never seemed to catch on. Instead, most of the chatter about new outlet prospects in Northeast Ohio has centered on suburban sites, including land in Garfield Heights that has been snarled in seemingly endless litigation.

Then the Horizon proposal, for the Outlet Shoppes at Cleveland, popped up. Marketing materials posted on the company's website and circulating in the real estate community show a building with two floors of retail, a central atrium and a food court perched atop at least two levels of structured parking. Those plans include approximately 1, 400 indoor parking spaces.

A spokeswoman for Horizon, based in Norton Shores, Michigan, returned a phone call about the proposal but ultimately did not answer questions or make executives available for an interview.

According to financial reports, Horizon has outlet centers, other retail properties and development sites in at least eight states and has formed outlet-shopping joint ventures with CBL & Associates Properties, Inc., a major player in the shopping-mall business.

CBL did not respond to an inquiry about whether it, also, is looking at Cleveland.

Developer Fred Geis confirmed that Horizon is interested, but he wouldn't talk about any real estate negotiations or the Outlet Shoppes at Cleveland proposal.

"They've met with me, " Geis said. "They've met with the city and the county. We're all very anxious to see them come to Cleveland."

Representatives for the city and the department of port control, which oversees Burke airport and the adjacent land, have been difficult to reach this week because of the Republican National Convention.

Since 2012, the city and Geis have been working through complex due diligence to make development possible on the 20-acre site, which requires sign-offs from the state - related to arcane underground land-lease issues - and from the Federal Aviation Administration - related to overhead airspace issues.

The city cannot sell lakefront land without a public vote. But Cleveland City Council can approve deals to give developers control of such waterfront property, through an option agreement or lease.

Geis initially approached the parking lot, which runs east from East Ninth Street to the Burke terminal, as an office-park site. The current lakefront master plan shows office buildings of two to nine stories near Burke, totaling more than 750, 000 square feet of offices plus parking. A few large office tenants are seeking space downtown, but they're being pursued by a handful of developers closer to the core of the central business district and on other lakefront property, to the west.

Joe Marinucci, chief executive of the nonprofit Downtown Cleveland Alliance, declined to comment on the outlet-shopping proposal. Local developer Dick Pace, who is working with the Trammell Crow Co. on a mixed-use development plan for nearby lakefront land around the the Rock Hall, the Great Lakes Science Center and FirstEnergy Stadium, said he hadn't seen the outlet concept.

"In general, we love seeing more development on the lakefront, " Pace said. "But we have to make sure that the quality of the development all fits together. It's not all going to be the same, but the pieces all need to fit with each other. I'm sure I'm going to hear more about it in the near future. Or, at least, I will be asking about it."

For a metropolitan area that's home to more than 2 million people, Northeast Ohio is arguably under-retailed when it comes to outlet shopping. Two existing centers, in Burbank and Aurora, are older properties that are at least 30 miles away from downtown Cleveland.