What's in the works in Santa Clara

It's possible that the massive Related Santa Clara construction project is still waiting for its official groundbreaking. Prologis Inc. might not yet have decided what will happen to the land currently occupied by California’s Great America after the amusement park closes in the next decade.

This does not mean that this city of 127,000 residents is not home to some major projects, which are either in construction or waiting for the final approval. Santa Clara has a number of projects in the pipeline.

Office: Perhaps because Santa Clara has the highest office vacancy rate in Silicon Valley, developers aren't rushing to build stand-alone projects. Both projects show no signs of progress.

The majority of mixed-use developments are residential in nature, and not primarily office. The Agrihood is a mixed-income project in Westfield Valley fair that includes senior housing, a 1.5-acre farm, and a 225 room hotel. Its first phase, Gateway Crossings by Hunter Properties, will eventually have 1,565 residential apartments, a 45,000-square-foot retail space, and a 225 room hotel.

Data Center: The Bay Area ranks No. Santa Clara, the top data center location in the Bay Area, is ranked No. 3 among U.S. data centers markets. The demand for data center services is not slowing down as evidenced by the construction of a number of four-story, windowless buildings. Three of these data centers -- Digital Realty (pictured), Vantage Data Centers, and Skybox Data Centers - should complete construction by the end of this year. They will bring around 1.5 million square foot of digital infrastructure into Santa Clara. A fourth facility, Amazon AWS’s first in Silicon Valley opened recently. CoreSite is currently building a fifth CoreSite.

Housing is the category that Santa Clara has the most projects under construction. A series of residential projects is also in the works, alongside Tasman east and other mixed-use developments. Villa Bella is the latest housing development on El Camino Real. It will include 56 condominiums by the end of the year. A 200-unit affordable housing project is currently in planning at 80 Saratoga Ave. Lawrence Station Area Plan is in its final stages of implementation. It includes projects both in Sunnyvale, and Santa Clara. Santa Clara will add 3,500 new homes when the Santa Clara section is completed.