Investment banking giant Morgan Stanley appears to want Dallas for its billion-dollar regional hug, and the city’s planning body signed off on a routine but key element of the potential project.
The Dallas City Plan and Zoning Commission approved a request for Morgan Stanley’s signage on skyscraper Fountain Place at 1445 Ross Ave. The certificates of appropriateness for two 366 square foot signs were passed under consent and without debate.
Under the plan, Fountain Place would serve as a temporary base while Morgan Stanley waits for a new Uptown high-rise. Morgan Stanley would lease about 255,000 square feet at Fountain Place for just over four years. Around 2031, the banking giant would then occupy roughly 700,000 square feet in a new Uptown tower at 2401 McKinney Ave. for 16 years.
Morgan Stanley plans to invest nearly $97 million and bring 1,500 jobs to Fountain Place by 2031. The firm will invest more than $684 million in the new Uptown building by 2031 and employ 3,800 people at the site by the end of 2035 with the possibility of additional relocations. The developer is expected to invest another $650 million to build Morgan Stanley’s new office, bringing the estimated value of the development to more than $1.3 billion, city documents show.
The move would dramatically increase Morgan Stanley’s more than 160,000 square feet of current office space in Dallas-Fort Worth. The largest share is housed at Uptown’s PwC Tower.
Construction of the new Uptown tower is slated to start this fall. While the bank has said nothing regarding its Dallas plans, city documents show that Morgan Stanley narrowed its search for an operational hub to two cities — Dallas and Alpharetta, Ga. Morgan Stanley has more than 3,000 employees in Alpharetta, making it one of the Atlanta suburb’s largest employers.
Morgan Stanley has also listed roughly 45 jobs in Dallas within the past two months. There’s no word on when Morgan Stanley will announce an official decision regarding the office hub, but the listings may be another sign of the move.