Developers are moving forward with a $3 million expansion at Liberty Lake Town Center, motivated by a flurry of leasing activity for a shopping center under construction across the street.


Design work already is under way on the expansion at Liberty Lake Town Center, and the retail centers owner, Wandermere Investments LLC, hopes to break ground on that project next March or April.


Dick Vandervert, managing member of Wandermere Investments, says the 37,000-square-foot addition could be completed by August 2000, giving the retail center a total of nearly 110,000 square feet of retail space.


The additional space would be built at the north end of the shopping center, which is anchored by an Albertsons Inc. supermarket and is located along the east side of Liberty Lake Road just south of the Liberty Lake-Interstate 90 interchange. Vandervert says the group is talking with potential tenants, but none have committed to the project yet.


Wandermere Investments decided to move forward with the expansion after a separate venture in which Vandervert is involved, called Sierra Developments LLC, rapidly leased out almost all of the planned space in a 75,000-square-foot retail center being built directly across Liberty Lake Road from Liberty Lake Town Center.


That new, $5.5 million retail center, which is to be called Liberty Lake Plaza, is expected to open in February.


A superstore to be opened by Safeway Stores Inc., of Pleasanton, Calif., previously had been announced as the anchor tenant for that development. Vandervert says newly signed tenants are a Quiznos Classic Subs outlet, a Dominos pizza store, and a Supercuts hair salon.


Several other businesses have signed letters of intent to lease space in the retail center, but Vandervert declines to name those companies until they sign leases.


At Liberty Lake Town Center, the decision to expand comes about six months after Wandermere Investments bought the retail center for $4.8 million from Boise-based Cantlon Properties Inc.