Perry Di Loreto started planning to develop Damonte Ranch in 1987. Two-and-a-half decades later, he is putting in the final touches with Downtown Damonte.

"Very seldom in our business activities as a developer do you get to save the very best for last and that's exactly what we've been able to do here at Damonte Ranch," Di Loreto, Master Developer of Damonte Ranch said.

Downtown Damonte will include retail, shopping, dining, bars, hotel rooms, office space and medical facilities. He says the growth of the community has brought high demand for more commercial options.

"It will be nice to have some choices for your dining experiences and maybe, probably more important, I bet you just a nice place for people to go," Di Loreto said. "You have to have the customer base to support your facility. I think at Damonte Ranch, downtown is overdue."

Di Loreto says Downtown Damonte will provide safe, friendly, family-oriented activities that will be convenient for the residents of south Reno. The project will include open space and multi-use paths for walking and biking, and up to 900 residential units.

"We'll have more residential opportunities within the Downtown Damonte area because it is going to be a combination of live, work and play, and socialize," Di Loreto said.

Downtown Damonte will span 73 acres from I-580 to the intersection of Steamboat Parkway and Damonte Ranch Parkway. Directly south will be the campus of Ridgeline, Inc. The company specialized in cloud-based financial technology.

"As many as 1,500 employees, well-paying jobs, software engineers, code writers and the facility is going to be nothing short of great," Di Loreto said.

To the south will be the home of Liberty Dogs campus. The goal is to provide the country's premier service dog training program for veterans. Veterans will live in the facility for approximately four weeks to get to know their pets and train with them.

"We will be setting a new standard, certainly for the country and quite possibly for around the world, as to this type of facility where you match veterans with their new partners," Di Loreto said.

More employees and residents does remind many residents that more traffic will follow. The Regional Transportation Commission has a plan to widen Steamboat Parkway to six lanes between Marketplace Drive to Veterans Parkway, while adding additional turning lanes where Steamboat Parkway intersects with Damonte Ranch Parkway and Veterans Parkway.

"All in all, our community, I think is pretty fortunate with our traffic situation," Di Loreto said. "Our local governments and our RTC have been ahead of it."

Road construction is slated to begin in the spring of 2023. Di Loreto says the location of I-580 and Veterans Parkway also help ease traffic congestion in the community.

Damonte Ranch is almost completely built-out. It includes up to 6,000 units as well as commercial and office space.

"I feel satisfied," Di Loreto said. "I think we've done a respectable job. There's not much I would go back and change."