Mission Valley Upward Bound

The rapid transition of San Diego’s Mission Valley from garden offices to mid- and high-rise complexes continues with the construction of the $100-million Rio Vista Towers at the southeast corner of Stadium Way and Friars Road.

The first phase of the two-phase Rio Vista development--a joint venture of CalMat Properties, Los Angeles, and Oliver McMillan Inc., San Diego--is scheduled for completion in the fall of 1988.

It includes a 200,000-square-foot, 12-story office building, two two-story, 13,000-square-foot pavilion buildings, a 3,600-square-foot health club and restaurant, and open space and water elements oriented to the San Diego River.

A twin high-rise in the second phase of the 430,000-square-foot project is expected to be constructed by 1990, according to Morgan Dene Oliver, a principal of Oliver McMillan, who added that the tower in the first phase features a three-story sloped atrium atop a cylindrical structure.

This is the first example of a sloped glass element intersecting a curved wall, according to Chuck Slert, architect with Buss Silvers Hughes Associates. The firm designed Rio Vista in conjunction with Los Angeles architect Anthony J. Lumsden.

Slert was a protege of Lumsden at DMJM in Los Angeles before joining the Buss Silvers Hughes firm.

“Rio Vista Towers will be visually intriguing--Tony (Lumsden) and I went through four versions before coming up with the design we’re using--and will move people’s emotions in a positive way,” Slert said of the glass and granite project. The granite is gray with pink flecks, while the glass is a pewter color.

Nielsen Construction Co., San Diego, is the general contractor and Land Studio is the landscape architect.

Slert added that the use of granite was a reference to CalMat, a unit of a building materials firm that was known as Conrock until the CalMat Co. was created in 1984 following the merger of California Portland Cement Co. and Conrock Co.

Rio Vista Towers is part of CalMat’s overall Rio Vista Center development, which will eventually include 110 acres of office, hotel, retail and residential development. According to a CalMat spokeswoman, development plans include 1.75 million square feet of office space, 1,200 hotel rooms, 1,400 apartment units, restaurants and retail space.

Completed on the site is a 95,705-square-foot atrium garden office building, she added. A 350-room Marriott Hotel is currently in process for the site.

The 16-story, 300,000-square-foot Centerside II tower by Homart Development Co. at 3111 Camino del Rio North just east of the intersection of Interstates 8 and 805, is expected to be the first of the new breed of office buildings to have space available, according to Dick Balestri of Coldwell Banker Commercial Real Estate Services, La Jolla.

The building, scheduled for completion this fall, is from the drawing boards of Deems/Lewis McKinley, San Diego, and is being built by Nielsen Construction, the same firm constructing the nearby Rio Vista project.

‘Strong, Consistent’

“With the large amounts of high-quality mid- and high-rise office space planned over the next 20 years, Mission Valley is going to continue to be one of San Diego’s strongest and most consistent office markets,” Balestri said.

In addition to the Rio Vista and Centerside projects, other major projects in Mission Valley include Sunroad Plaza III, adjacent to the Cabrillo (163) Freeway, with a 10-story, 220,000-square-foot tower expected to be ready late this year, and Hazard Center, a $200-million mixed-used project with two 15-story towers, expected to be completed by early 1989.

The latest survey by Coldwell Banker shows a 19.1% vacancy factor for Mission Valley, based on an inventory of 3.46 million square feet, he said.