JLL markets irreplaceable West Coast maritime campus with ~350 acres and 4 operational dry docks
Authors
Gréta Kieras
SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 18, 2026 – JLL announced today that it has been exclusively retained to provide strategic advisory and brokerage services for Mare Island Maritime Campus, a transformational +/- 350-acre maritime industrial property with two million square feet of existing buildings and four operational dry docks. Located in Vallejo, Calif., the former Mare Island Naval Shipyard represents a generational opportunity as federal mandates and bipartisan legislation drive the largest maritime industrial mobilization since World War II.
JLL is advising The Nimitz Group, owner of the maritime industrial land and assets, on repositioning the property’s irreplaceable maritime infrastructure to accommodate surging demand for domestic ship and submarine manufacturing. The owner is pursuing flexible transaction structures, including leasing individual assets or entering into strategic partnerships with investors or tenants.
Established in 1854 as the first permanent U.S. Navy base on the West Coast, Mare Island operated continuously until 1996, employing over 40,000 workers at its wartime peak and building nuclear submarines throughout the 1950s and 1960s. The property is now privately controlled and positioned to meet surging demand for domestic shipbuilding capacity.
The campus features irreplaceable maritime infrastructure including four dry docks, three shipways, two miles of seawall, one mile of berthing, 30-foot channel depth with deepwater access and over 30 megawatts of available power capacity. The property includes significant development-ready land for expansion and modernization.
Mare Island’s strategic location provides access to Solano County’s highly skilled, ready workforce. Additionally, the site is positioned 60 miles from Silicon Valley, allowing operators to tap into the 20% of U.S. artificial intelligence talent located in the Bay Area. This makes Mare Island the only West Coast private shipyard with existing capacity and a workforce-ready ecosystem prepared to support immediate technology-enabled defense or commercial operations.
Greg Matter, who co-leads JLL’s Advanced Manufacturing Group; Matt Bracco, who co-leads JLL’s North Bay Industrial team; Kristi Childers with JLL’s Agency Leasing group; and Karlen Beitman with JLL’s Public Institutions’ Strategic Advisory team are leading the marketing and advisory efforts. Additionally, Peter Miscovich with JLL’s Consulting practice; Matt Do with JLL’s Government & Education Advisory practice; and Tom Taylor, who leads JLL’s Aerospace and Defense Work Dynamics practice, represent the key JLL advisory groups involved.
“This is existing infrastructure that simply cannot be replicated: four operational dry docks, deepwater access and workforce-ready facilities that were built once and are ready now for the maritime resurgence happening across the country,” Matter said.
The property can accommodate public-private partnerships, anchor tenant arrangements, build-to-suit configurations or acquisitions to support federal and commercial maritime objectives. JLL is actively engaging with shipbuilders, defense contractors, maritime operators and institutional investors seeking to participate in the expanding U.S. naval and commercial shipbuilding sector.
“What makes Mare Island truly irreplaceable is that this level of existing maritime infrastructure simply doesn’t exist anywhere else on the West Coast in private hands,” Beitman added. “At a time when the nation is prioritizing domestic shipbuilding capacity and naval expansion, Mare Island offers speed, scale, and strategic capability that would take decades and billions to recreate from scratch.”
For more news, videos and research resources, please visit JLL’s newsroom.
Jones Lang LaSalle Americas, Inc. ("JLL") is a real estate broker licensed with the California Department of Real Estate, license #01223413.
About JLL
JLL (NYSE:JLL) is a leading global commercial real estate services and investment management company with annual revenue of $26.1 billion, operations in over 80 countries and a global workforce of more than 112,000 as of June 30, 2026. For over 200 years, clients have trusted JLL, a Fortune 500® company, to help them confidently buy, build, occupy, manage and invest across a variety of industries and property types, including office, industrial, hotel, multi-family, retail and data center properties. Driven by our purpose to shape the future of real estate for a better world, we help our clients, people and communities SEE A BRIGHTER WAY. Powered by rich global datasets and leading technology capabilities, we provide coordinated, end-to-end delivery of real estate services for a broad range of global clients who represent a wide variety of industries. Through LaSalle Investment Management, we invest for clients on a global basis in both private assets and publicly traded real estate securities. For further information, visit jll.com.
About The Nimitz Group
The Nimitz Group is the real estate holding and development entity behind the Mare Island Maritime Campus, backed by the Lawrence Family Office (LFO). The Lawrence Family Office manages a highly diversified, multi-generational portfolio of operating companies, diversified holdings between banking, agribusiness and wineries and strategic real estate assets. LFO is committed to long-term stewardship, economic revitalization, and partnering with public and private operators to transform historic assets into critical hubs for domestic manufacturing, national security, and advanced technology.