Spring 2018

SPRING FEATURE
25 Years of Progress
By Mike Martin
The Desert Ridge story
begins in the late 1980s
when the nation was struggling
out of a long economic
downturn. A local real estate
broker came to our office at the
Viehmann, Martin Company
to pitch a couple of developable
sites. Among these was a
5,700-acre tract of state land
straddling Tatum Boulevard,
north of the CAP Canal. It
seemed likely that metropolitan
Phoenix would continue to grow
northward, no river, mountain
or reservation presenting a
natural barrier in that direction.
With our experience in mall
development, my partner Don
Viehmann and I thought this
location could someday support
a major shopping center.
The Arizona Legislature had recently passed
the Urban Lands Act, allowing the State
Land Department to sell or lease land for
development in the state’s two metropolitan
areas, Phoenix and Tucson. The 5,700 acres
of interest to us was then held by a local
family under a lease to graze cattle. Our
purchase of that grazing lease gave us rights
of first refusal at a land department auction
of commercial leases, necessary for the
development of a large retail center.
With a long-time friend and business
associate, Tom Klutznick, we created
an entity that would become Northeast
Phoenix Partners (NPP), which would
eventually be the master developer of
Desert Ridge. But first there was a lot of
work to be done. The City of Phoenix was
not initially interested in annexing land
north of the CAP Canal. However, this
position changed when ADOT announced
plans for a freeway route, the 101 Loop,
through this area.
Northeast Phoenix Partners hired Barton
Myers Associates of Santa Barbara,
California, to do the basic land use
Cactus harvesting
Early years
8 | Desert Ridge Lifestyles | Spring 2018
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