One piece of developer Ali Sahabi's dream of transforming a mine-pocked swath of land in south Corona into a model master-planned community becomes a reality this week. But it hasn't been an easy road.

Sahabi, 41, thought his plan might be derailed when he lost the possibility of landing Kohl's after the department store chain chose to open nearby in a new 100-acre shopping center.

"I was devastated," Sahabi recalled.

But he managed to persuade developer Poag & McEwen to build its trendy brand of outdoor shopping center -- a highly styled mix of restaurants and specialty stores in a main-street setting -- beside Interstate 15 in south Corona. The Promenade Shops at Dos Lagos opens Friday.

The debut of Dos Lagos helps to validate the ability of western Riverside County to support the kind of upscale stores and restaurants that its residents, many of them Orange County transplants, have missed. The shopping center, complete with a multiplex cinema and amphitheater, will have no department stores -- traditionally essential at Inland malls.

The namesake lakes sit at the heart of Dos Lagos, which, in addition to the shopping center, now includes an 18-hole golf course and 135 acres of open space and, when completed, is expected to have more than 1,000 homes, three office buildings and a 300-room hotel.

First Phase

About 65 percent of the stores in the first phase are expected to be ready Friday, with the remainder opening gradually within the next year, Terry McEwen, president of Poag & McEwen said. An added 200,000 square feet of retail is planned to be completed in the fall of 2008.

By spring, four restaurants offering outdoor seating are to be in place around the lake. McEwen said a fifth lakeside pad is being reserved for another, undetermined restaurant.

Judy Diehl, 67, a resident in the Trilogy senior community close to Dos Lagos, said she, her husband and their neighbors are eager to spend time and money at Dos Lagos.

"We are all saying, 'Come on, come on,' " she said.

John Scotti, vice president of real estate for Ann Taylor, which is opening an Ann Taylor Loft at Dos Lagos, said the company was lured by the strong growth of its sales at Riverside's Galleria at Tyler and at Victoria Gardens in Rancho Cucamonga.

But it remains to be seen how rapidly the people of western Riverside County will embrace this new concept, said Steve Johnson, a director of Metro Study, a Riverside real estate consulting firm.

Mark Zaleski / The Press-Enterprise Terry McEwen is considered a founder of the lifestyle-center concept, which is catching on across the country. The Promenade Shops at Dos Lagos in Corona is his company's first center in California.

He said the steady stream of affluent professionals moving from Orange County into Corona's new executive-level housing is giving the city the demographics needed to support upscale shopping.

Less favorable is the number of people living within a five-mile radius of Dos Lagos versus the number living that close to Victoria Gardens, said Scott Kaplan, a senior managing director of retail for CB Richard Ellis.

McEwen said the trade area for Dos Lagos is already as strong as that for Victoria Gardens, and 20,000 more homes are planned nearby.

Kaplan said The Crossings at Corona, a 1.1 million- square-foot center just up I-15 that offers Kohl's and other big-box retailers, will not compete with Dos Lagos because the two centers are different enough to draw shoppers to both.

First in California

After losing Kohl's to The Crossings, Sahabi said, he intentionally looked for retail that would stand out.

When he approached Memphis-based Poag & McEwen three years ago, McEwen turned him down in part because Riverside County had a blue-collar image.

Sahabi invited McEwen to visit the area, paying for the plane ticket and putting him up at Riverside's Mission Inn.

"That was the best $1,500 I invested," Sahabi said.

The meeting sparked McEwen's interest in Dos Lagos and led his company to choose Corona for its ninth center -- its first in California.

Studies by his company and national retailers showed that the western Inland region had the affluence that specialty stores crave, McEwen said.

He liked Sahabi's integration of retail into a community that also includes housing, a hotel and offices.

The Marquez family, recently touring home models at Dos Lagos, said they live nine miles away and love the idea of living within walking distance of stores and restaurants.

Art Marquez, 41, scanned a list of the retailers until one caught his eye.

"This will do it for me -- T.G.I. Friday's," he said.