Industrial property in the Tampa Bay area has a new vacant look, according to a new report by the Colliers Arnold real estate firm.

So far this year 2.78 million square feet of industrial property has opened up, more or less evenly spread among Tampa International Airport, The Gateway section of Pinellas County and East Tampa.

Colliers Arnold blamed the downsizing on the economy and the housing slump. Since the end of 2006, the vacancy rate has doubled from 4.7 percent to 9.3 percent.

To keep things in perspective, that 2.78 million square feet of new vacancy makes up 1.3 percent of the total inventory of 206 million square feet. But the trend isn't encouraging.