2024 Non-residential Construction Report Released
Posted March 24, 2025
Each year the Chester County Planning Commission prepares a Non-residential Construction Report based on the number of new non-residential square feet added to the county. The areas of "non-residential" square feet include buildings in the areas of agricultural, commercial, industrial, and institutional.
Some major takeaways from the 2024 report include findings that new square footage increased 191,733 square feet from 2023 to 2024; there were 10 fewer projects in 2024 than 2023; and commercial and institutional had the largest new square feet for the second year in a row.
Specifically, there were 1,107,081 new non-residential square feet in 2024, compared to 915,348 in 2023. However, the numbers prior to 2023 were slightly higher than they were in 2024, indicating that square footage from 2016 to 2024 has remained mostly consistent (as seen in this chart).
As mentioned, commercial and institutional were the top two areas of non-residential square feet added in 2024. There were 444,418 institutional square feet and 423,708 commercial square feet, followed by 141,900 agricultural and 105,285 industrial square feet.
In terms of municipalities, East Whiteland, West Fallowfield, and West Goshen townships had the greatest total new non-residential square feet; West Goshen, East Marlborough townships and West Chester Borough had the greatest commercial square feet; Uwchlan, West Whiteland, and West Brandywine townships had the most industrial square feet; and East Whiteland, East Pikeland, and West Sadsbury townships had the highest new institutional construction. West Fallowfield Township was the only municipality to have agricultural building development.
There were four projects with over 100,000 square feet constructed in 2024, including a second part of the Great Valley School District 5/6 Center in East Whiteland Township (institutional), the West Conservatory commercial project in East Marlborough Township (commercial), a new Elementary School in East Pikeland Township (institutional), and a self-storage facility in West Goshen Township (commercial).
The report showed a decrease in the total number of projects, from 44 projects in 2023, to 34 projects in 2024, however the average size of the projects increased.
This information was presented by CCPC's Senior Economic and Housing Planner, Libby Horwitz, to the CCPC board in March 2025.
Learn more about the 2024 Non-residential Construction Report, or previous years.