Storage firm plans Kaka'ako facility
By Andrew Gomes
Advertiser Staff Writer
Giant storage facility operator Public Storage Inc. is considering buying a parcel of vacant land on Kapi'olani Boulevard to build its seventh warehouse on O'ahu.
The California-based company has held preliminary discussions with the state agency overseeing development in Kaka'ako about building one of its typical big-box storage facilities on the corner of Kamake'e Street and Kapi'olani.
Public Storage has not yet bought the property, but it has a contract to purchase the site from the owner, according to one person familiar with the deal.
Property owner Thomas Sorensen, who is planning to develop a three-story interior design center on adjacent parcels, said he could not discuss the pending transaction because of confidentiality requirements.
Public Storage representatives did not return calls seeking comment earlier this week.
Daniel Dinell, executive director of the Hawai'i Community Development Authority, said Public Storage had advised the state agency of its plan, but it had not submitted any formal development applications.
Dinell said the planning agency urged Public Storage to look at options to incorporate other types of uses with the storage facility. "They seemed amenable to looking at that," he said.
The plan, if pursued, would mark a continuing expansion by Public Storage, which has facilities in 'Aiea, Kane'ohe, Waipi'o, Wai'alae, Kahala and Pearl City.
The company opened its first Hawai'i facility in the early 1990s and most recently opened a Pearl City location about five months ago after buying land from Home Depot for $4.4 million and spending $4.8 million to construct the 105,000-square-foot building.
The company calls itself the largest owner and operator of public storage space in the United States, with 1,410 facilities at the end of 2003. In its annual report filed in March, Public Storage said it had 13 new facilities in the development pipeline at the end of last year that it expected to open in one to two years.
The Kapi'olani/Kamake'e property, next to the relatively new storage facility Self Storage 1, once housed the Hawai'i headquarters of Eastman Kodak Co. In the mid-1990s, Japanese investors planned to build a luxury condominium on the site, but a downturn in the high-end residential condo market scuttled the project.
Sorensen, who owns Inspiration Furniture at Pearlridge, bought the site in 2001 from Fukuoka Jisho for about $8 million and demolished existing buildings. In separate transactions, Sorensen bought adjacent parcels with Fukuoka Jisho to be used as part of his planned $25 million design center. A timetable for that development has not been set, Sorensen said.
Reach Andrew Gomes at agomes@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8065.
