Sports Club Inks $13M Lease in Radnor Financial Center

RADNOR, PA-New York City-based Town Sports International has inked a 15-year lease for a 42,000-sf Philadelphia Sports Club at 555 Lancaster Ave., a 238,000-sf building currently under renovation by Plymouth Meeting-based Brandywine Realty Trust. The aggregate value of the lease is in excess of $13 million, according to Pat McCabe and Kevin McClernon of the Philadelphia office of CB Richard Ellis, who represented TSI in the negotiations.

This, TSI’s seventh Philadelphia Sports Club, will occupy space on the ground floor and lower level of the building, an area that formerly served as the building’s data center. The new space, designed by Carelli Architects, will include three studios and a four-lane, 75-foot swimming pool in addition to locker rooms, a café, baby-sitting center, sauna, steam room and parking. It is expected to open in summer 2006. TSI operates more than 140 fitness centers in Philadelphia, New York, Boston and Washington, DC.

Jim Paterno of Stockton Real Estate Advisors represented Brandywine in the TSI transaction. According to David S. Ryder, SVP of Brandywine, the TSI lease reflects a strategy to complement the company’s office holdings in Radnor with a retail tenant mix. Brandywine is repositioning the building as a “high-end, mixed-use destination, featuring restaurants, fitness and other retail services along with the market’s finest class A office space,” he says. This building is one of three in Radnor Financial Center, which Brandywine acquired from Rubenstein Co. approximately a year ago.