A Target opened at Signal Butte Road and Southern Avenue this summer, the first tenant to go live inside the long-planned Medina Station development. It has a CVS Pharmacy, a Starbucks counter, and a Target Optical department, and it employs more than 190 people. What it doesn't have, two months later, is a next-door restaurant to eat at afterward.
That gap between the anchor and the amenities is the actual story of Medina Station this fall, and it's worth understanding if you live anywhere near Signal Butte, Southern, or the Eastmark and Augusta Ranch neighborhoods this corner is meant to serve.
What's Actually Open at Signal Butte and Southern
The Target that opened in July is Mesa's sixth location, a 148,000-square-foot store built as the first completed piece of a 64.5-acre project developer SimonCRE has been assembling since 2024. It was also the first retailer of any kind to open at Medina Station, ahead of Dick's Sporting Goods, ahead of the restaurants, ahead of the personal-care and service tenants that make up the rest of the site plan.
That sequencing matters. A big-box anchor can be built, stocked, and staffed on a single construction timeline. A restaurant row is a dozen separate build-outs, each with its own contractor, its own health inspection, its own opening date that the tenant controls, not the developer. Medina Station's Target proves the first kind of opening is done. It says nothing about the second.
The Restaurant Row Has a Tenant List. It Doesn't Have a Kitchen Yet.
The dining lineup announced for Medina Station reads like a solid Saturday night out: Café Zupas, Hawaiian Bros Island Grill, Mission BBQ, CAVA, OHSO Brewery, Five Guys, Handel's Homemade Ice Cream, Einstein Bros. Bagels, and Cheba Hut have all signed leases for space along the project's landscaped restaurant corridor. Boot Barn, Zara Nails, GoodVets, and a handful of other service tenants round out the rest of the site.
SimonCRE CEO Joshua Simon has been direct about what's driving the restaurant push:
"We're excited for upcoming restaurant announcements to bring fine dining to far East Mesa, which definitely got a lot of needs that are currently unmet."
None of those signed restaurants had a public opening date as of this fall. Dick's Sporting Goods, the project's second anchor at roughly 80,000 square feet across two stories, was expected to follow Target onto the site, according to ABC15's coverage of the development, but even that retail opening hadn't been confirmed yet. The restaurants sit further back in the queue than the big-box tenants do, which is normal for a project like this and also means the food is the last thing to show up, not the first.
Here's how the signed tenant list breaks down by category:
Category | Confirmed Tenants |
|---|---|
Big-box anchors | Target (open), Dick's Sporting Goods (pending) |
Restaurants | Café Zupas, Hawaiian Bros, Mission BBQ, CAVA, OHSO Brewery, Five Guys, Handel's, Einstein Bros. Bagels, Cheba Hut |
Retail and services | Boot Barn, Zara Nails, GoodVets, U.S. Bank, V's Barbershop, Pacific Dental |
Roughly 40 of the site's 64.5 acres are dedicated to retail and dining, with the remaining 23 acres set aside for more than 600 apartment units across two residential projects. The housing and the restaurants are, in effect, being built on the same clock. Neither is finished yet.
Three Miles West, a Smaller Opening Beat Them To It
While Medina Station's restaurant corridor works through its lease-up, a much smaller opening has already secured its address at Santa Fe Square, the existing shopping center at Gilbert Road and Southern Avenue. Santa Fe Square isn't new. It's a 367,741-square-foot center that has anchored that corner for years, home to an existing 110,000-square-foot Target, an AutoZone, and an ALDI listed as coming soon, along with longtime tenants like Frutilandia and Sekai Sushi.
What's new there is Mahana Fresh, a gluten-free bowl concept opening its first Arizona location at 943 S. Gilbert Road, Suite 101, inside Santa Fe Square. The spot is more than 2,700 square feet with indoor and outdoor seating, and it's being developed by three local franchisees, Jason Albrecht, Ryan Lloyd, and Scott Rogers, who already own The Shop Gym next door. That gym has been open since 2017, and the trio's decision to put a bowl restaurant directly beside it wasn't incidental. Albrecht spent years in the restaurant industry before moving into fitness, and the pairing of a health-focused eatery with an existing gym crowd is the kind of local logic that doesn't show up in a developer's leasing brochure. Mahana Fresh is expected to open by the end of 2026, according to reporting on the deal, though like the Medina Station restaurants, it hasn't posted a firm date yet.
The comparison isn't about which project is bigger. Medina Station is by far the larger development, with a big-box anchor already open and a bench of national restaurant brands lined up behind it. But Mahana Fresh has a specific suite number, a signed lease, and owners who already run the business next door. It's a smaller opening with fewer moving parts, which is exactly why it's likely to seat its first customer before most of Medina Station's restaurant row does.
What This Means If You're Eating Dinner Near Either Corner
For residents near Signal Butte and Southern, the practical read is simple. The Target is open and fully functional, pharmacy and coffee counter included. Everything else on that pad, from Dick's Sporting Goods to the nine restaurants with signed leases, is still under construction or in build-out. If you're picturing a walk from a new apartment to a sit-down dinner at Mission BBQ or CAVA, that walk isn't available yet.
For residents near Gilbert and Southern, the existing mix at Santa Fe Square, Frutilandia's shaved ice and Sonora-style hot dogs, Sekai Sushi, the Target that's been there for years, still covers most weeknight needs. Mahana Fresh will add to that lineup before Medina Station's restaurant row is likely to open its first door, even though it's the smaller story of the two.
East Mesa is getting more dining options this year. It's just getting them on two different clocks, at two different corners, and the bigger headline isn't necessarily the faster one.
If you're watching how retail growth like this shapes interest in the surrounding neighborhoods, or you're curious what a corner like Signal Butte and Southern might mean for property values once the restaurant row actually opens, Luxe Client Group keeps track of these shifts as part of how we read East Valley markets. Reach out anytime you'd like a closer look.
