The city of Mobile and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Mobile District kicked off construction for a new office building on the site of the Mobile Civic Center.

“There’s a lot of great work going on downtown,” Colonel Jeremy Chapman, commander of the Mobile Divisision, said. “In fact, billions of dollars are being invested here, not just this building…there’s a lot of good things going on in Mobile.”

The building, which is scheduled to be completed in late 2024 or early 2025, will house around 800 workers for the Army Corps of Engineers. The city of Mobile is also slated to construct a parking garage to accompany the office building. Construction on the garage is expected to begin in the next 90 days, Jim DeLapp, the city’s executive director of public works and a former colonel in the corps of engineers, said.

But officials say that it’s more than just a building—it will change the skyline in downtown Mobile and spur further development of the civic center. Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson said that a hotel is planned for the footprint of the civic center, in addition to renovating the civic center itself.

“This is the first domino to fall,” Stimpson said. “When you get the parking garage, then that really allows other things to start happening around the civic center, because you solve what is a major problem right now.”