Business Park Being Built on Steel Site

Constuction is nearing completion on the $38-million, 31-acre Vernon Business Park, being built on the site of the old Bethlehem Steel plant at the southwest corner of Slauson Avenue and Downey Road in Vernon.

A February completion is scheduled for the 678,000-square-foot, 14-building project by the Los Angeles office of Trammell Crow Co. in a joint venture with Copley Real Estate Advisors of Boston.

Vernon has been an exclusively industrial city since its incorporation in 1905, according to Mayor Leonis C. Malburg, who added that the Vernon Business Park will be the first of its kind in the city to conform “to our new zoning ordinance, which encourages manufacturing uses.”

The architect is Lee & Sakahara of Irvine, and the contractor is John A. Alexander Co., Santa Fe Springs. The Peridian Group of Irvine is the landscape architect.

Space will be available in increments from 6,000 to 678,000 square feet, according to Adam Richey of Trammell Crow. He added that the market for users for the park includes the garment industry, import-export firms, food industry concerns and assembly and manufacturing companies.