Fresno H&E Nursery building knocked down for commercial retail center

JPD Properties will build a 14,000-square-foot center in next 12 to 14 months

DECEMBER 23, 2015 10:01 AM

BY BONHIA LEE

The H&E Nursery building on Nees Avenue, near River Park, was torn down last week to make way for a new commercial retail development named Rio Plaza.

JPD Properties – a partnership between businessmen John Pardini, Patrick Peters and Dror Geron – bought the one-and-a-half-acre lot from owner Roy Harris this summer. The plan is to build a 14,000-square-foot center in the next 12 to 14 months with space for several franchises that are expected to create about 100 new jobs when complete, Geron said.

“We are looking at a mixed-use with a couple of quick-serve style restaurants,” Geron said. “There is a great opportunity for some franchises and new growth with new concepts coming to town.”

The partners jumped at the chance to buy the land when H&E, a longtime flower and plant nursery with stores in Fresno and Clovis, closed.

“This became an opportunity that we simply couldn’t resist, as far as the purchase of the land, being that it’s literally the last piece of real estate in the River Park trade area,” Geron said.

Michael Kennedy and John Lee of Retail California are marketing the property. Scott Vincent of The Vincent Company in Fresno is the architect.

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