About 1,200 employees of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Nebraska are moving into their new digs right on schedule, leaving their old offices on 72nd Street for a new 10-story building in Aksarben Village five blocks to the east.
Employees from the two headquarters buildings at 72nd Street and Mercy Road moved the past two weekends.
Blue Cross also owns the Omaha Tower, just to the north of the headquarters buildings, which houses employees of the insurer as well as other tenants. Blue Cross employees will move out this weekend.
The only thing not on schedule: sale of the old buildings, which officials of Blue Cross had hoped to complete by now.
“The real estate market is not booming right now,” Janet Richardson, Blue Cross senior vice president, said dryly.
So the buildings, listed at approximately $45 million, remain on the market. No offers are pending.
Blue Cross expects to save at least $2 million a year by selling the buildings and investing the money. The insurer plans to use the money to upgrade computer systems or make other improvements that will boost efficiency.
Blue Cross has a 25-year lease on the new $98 million Aksarben building at 67th and Frances Streets.
Tetrad Development of Omaha is the developer and owner of the building, which was designed by Leo A. Daly Co. and built by Kiewit Corp.
Construction began in 2008, and Blue Cross took possession on Christmas Eve.
Richardson scheduled the move in three segments so the offices could keep operating during the process.
The new building, with energy-saving and environmentally friendly features, has 315,000 square feet of space, about the size of five football fields, with an attached 1,200-stall parking garage, surface parking, an employee cafeteria and a wellness center.
Blue Cross opened its first 72nd Street building in 1968 and added the second in 1997.
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