Despite the recent announcement that Chicago-based General Growth Properties Inc. has dropped plans to build a regional mall at the Pabst Farms development at Highway 67 and Interstate 94 in Oconomowoc, development of other areas of Pabst Farms continues to progress.

A group of investors, including some of the principals of Milwaukee-based The Dickman Company Inc., plans to build three multi-tenant light industrial buildings on a 13-acre lot at the northwest corner of Blue Ribbon Circle North and Delafield Road in the Pabst Farms Commerce Centre, which is located southwest of I-94 and Highway 67. One of the light industrial buildings will have 30,000 square feet of space, and the other two will each have 52,500 square feet, for a total of 135,000 square feet.

The development will be just north of the Roundy's distribution center in Pabst Farms and just west of a development being planned by Fitchburg-based S&L Hospitality that would include two hotels, a 40,000-square-foot office building and a stand-alone restaurant.

The 30,000-square-foot building will be built first, and construction will begin this fall or early next spring, said Sam Dickman Sr., president of The Dickman Company and one of the investors for the proposed Pabst Farms light industrial buildings. The Dickman Company is also handling the brokerage for the buildings.

"We're currently negotiating with a tenant for about 25 percent of the (30,000-square-foot) building," Dickman said. "The first tenant is scheduled to move in in June or July."

Construction of the other buildings will begin when more tenants are lined up, he said.

Brookfield-based Briohn Building Corp. is the general contractor and architect for the project.

There is a lack of available sites in the Milwaukee area with freeway access and infrastructure in place for new industrial development. That makes the Pabst Farms site attractive.

"We think that the whole (Pabst Farms) development is really going to move the center of commercial activity in the Milwaukee area to the west," Dickman said.

The first major signs of the City of Milwaukee's efforts to revitalize the 30th Street Industrial Corridor will be seen next year. That's when work on a streetscaping project along Capitol Drive between 27th Street and 35th Street will begin. The city is providing a $500,000 grant and a $500,000 loan to the corridor's business improvement district (BID) for the project.

The streetscaping improvements will include decorative crosswalks, street furniture, new trash cans, harp lights, enhanced gateways, traffic calming street bump-outs, signs, rain gardens, trees and other landscaping amenities.

The Capitol Drive project is expected to be complete in 2009. It will be the first phase of a 10-year streetscaping improvement plan for the corridor. Other streets that the corridor's BID hopes to improve are Fond du Lac Avenue, Hopkins, Burleigh, Locust, 27th, 35th, Center and Townsend Streets.

Improving the aesthetics of the streets will help attract businesses to the 30th Street Industrial Corridor, said BID executive director Brenna Holly.

Last year, city officials announced that the 30th Street Industrial Corridor will be the city's next major brownfield redevelopment project. The corridor once had several manufacturers along the old SOO Line Railroad tracks. Many of those companies moved or went out of business, leaving brownfields behind in a part of the central city with a high level of crime and a desperate need for more jobs. However, some companies remain in the corridor, including DRS Power & Control Technologies Inc., Master Lock Co. and Eaton Corp.

In 2005, businesses in the corridor formed the BID, which district hired Madison-based Schreiber Anderson Associates to do the design work for the streetscape improvements.

According to a recent BusinessWeek report, the metropolitan Milwaukee area is the second-most "toxic town" in America.

The ranking is based on the number of contaminated sites per capita. The source for the information is Milford, Conn.-based Environmental Data Resources.

According to the report, the Milwaukee area has 47,531 contaminated sites, or 1 for every 32 residents in the area. The Milwaukee has 3,872 leaking storage tanks, according to the report.

Baltimore was rated the most "toxic town," by the BusinessWeek report by having the highest number of contaminated sites per capita. Other metro areas in the top 10 were: Portland, Ore.; Los Angeles; the Twin Cities; Indianapolis; San Diego; Detroit; Seattle; and Cincinnati.

The Los Angeles area ranks first when it comes to sheer numbers of contaminated sites, with a total of 271,360, according to the report. The New York and Chicago metro areas follow with 191,356 and 103,704 contaminated sites, respectively.

Commercial real estate owners, developers and brokers are invited to submit their best properties for consideration in a free listing for the annual Small Business Times Honor Roll of Prime Leasable Commercial Real Estate.

For the first time, properties can be submitted online at www.biztimes.com/primeleasablespace.

The Honor Roll is a directory of prime office, industrial and retail sites with space for lease in Milwaukee, Waukesha, Walworth, Racine, Kenosha, Washington, Ozaukee and Sheboygan counties.

The best sites will be selected by the SBT editorial staff and will be featured in the Honor Roll, which will be published in the SBT Commercial Real Estate & Development Book. The publication will be unveiled Thursday, Nov. 8, at the SBT Commercial Real Estate & Development Conference.

In addition to the Honor Roll, the publication will include exclusive market research, interviews with real estate experts and an updated SBT Municipal Development Guide.

The conference will take place at the Italian Community Center.

The theme for this year's conference will be "Back to the City." The breakfast event will explore the demographic factors that are driving more people to move back to urban settings and will examine the best practices of successful downtowns.

The annual conference is presented by SBT in conjunction with the Robert B. Bell Real Estate Program of Marquette University and the Commercial Association of Realtors Wisconsin (CARW).

This year's panel of expert speakers will provide insight about the rebirth of urban commercial real estate markets from a variety of perspectives. The panelists will include:

Afshin Ghazi, founder and president of The Ghazi Company, a Charlotte, N.C.-based commercial real estate development company that plans to build a $120 million mixed-use development with 200 condos, a 175-room boutique hotel and 100,000 square feet of entertainment, restaurant and retail space in downtown Milwaukee.

Tony Smith, practice leader at S. B. Friedman & Company, a specialized real estate and development advisory firm based in Chicago. Earlier this year, Smith and the Friedman team completed a strategic analysis of downtown projects for the Milwaukee Department of City Development.

Brian Vandewalle, founder and president of VandeWalle & Associates, a Madison consulting company that has opened an office in Milwaukee. Vandewalle created various economic development and downtown revitalization and master plans for several Wisconsin communities and has been hired by the City of Milwaukee as a consultant to create its City Strategic Economic Development Plan.

The conference will be emceed by Professor Mark Eppli, Ph.D., chair of the Robert B. Bell Real Estate Program at Marquette. Opening remarks will be provided by Richard "Rocky" Marcoux, commissioner of the Milwaukee Department of City Development.

The annual conference is intended to provide insight for people and companies with interests in the commercial real estate industry. More than 400 people, including Realtors, developers, brokers, architects, contractors, subcontractors, environmental experts, engineers, financial experts, municipal planners, attorneys and others, attended last year's conference.

The conference also will include the presentation of the Robert B. Bell Best Public Partner Award to a local government official who has been an advocate for commercial real estate development.

To view an online registration form for the SBT Commercial Real Estate & Development Conference, visit http://www.biztimes.com/biztimes/CREfaxForm.pdf.

Kenosha-based Riley Construction recently hired Suzanne Choren as a senior business development representative.

Brookfield-based Briohn Building Corp. recently hired Nelson Williams as director of sales and marketing.

Pewaukee-based VJS Construction Services recently hired Lisa Leick as a graphic designer and Matt Rosch as an assistant project manager. VJS also recently promoted Rich Wieloch to director of special products.

The Brookfield office of Minneapolis-based Mortenson Construction recently promoted Charlie Eads to assistant project manager and hired Jason Wilson as project engineer.

Brookfield-based Shorewest Realtors hired Eva Bruce as a sales associate in its Kenosha office and Ray Wreford as a sales associate in its New Berlin office.

The Sendik's store under construction in the Fountains of Franklin development at West Rawson Avenue and South 51st Street will hold a grand open and ribbon cutting ceremony on Wednesday, Oct. 31.

The cities of Oak Creek and Franklin recently received the 2007 Wisconsin Good Government Award for their cooperative planning efforts to develop the South 27th Street corridor.

The University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, which is in the middle of several campus building projects, was recently nominated for WasteCap's Big Diverter Award. The award honors professionals and businesses that work to reduce, reuse and recycle construction and demolition debris.

Signature Group Inc., a division of Milwaukee-based Jansen Group Inc., recently won two 2007 Wisconsin Golden Trowel Awards, which are sponsored by the International Masonry Institute, for a pair of church construction projects.