Parking Lot Safety Examined

Wal-Mart Wants Outdoor Lighting Issue Reconsidered [Yakima (Wash.) Herald-Republic]

They’re baaack.

Saying it wants to ensure customer safety, Wal-Mart is disputing yet another condition placed on the giant retailer’s plans for a new superstore in the West Valley.

This time the issue is outdoor lighting, which mainly involves the store parking lot but is also a concern to neighbors.

“Right now it’s not well lit, and we all feel that’s very unsafe,” Wal-Mart spokeswoman Jennifer Holder said Friday during a phone call from her regional corporate office in Seattle.

Responding to Wal-Mart’s concerns, city officials scheduled a public hearing Aug. 29 before hearings examiner Gary Cuillier at Yakima City Hall.

Restrictions on site lighting were among 50-plus conditions imposed on Wal-Mart in its long-running battle to build a superstore on Congdon orchard property at 64th Avenue and Nob Hill Boulevard.

Wal-Mart appealed some of those conditions by filing a lawsuit against the city of Yakima. Though most issues have been resolved in the company’s favor, Wal-Mart is keeping the lawsuit in a holding pattern for now, “in case things haven’t settled,” Holder said.

So far Wal-Mart has wriggled out of having to pay the lion’s share of improvements to Nob Hill that the city projects will be needed due to the extra traffic the store will attract.

The company wants to install high-pressure sodium lights instead of the low-pressure lights required by the city, saying it wants to make sure the parking lot is safe at night. But doing so would violate the 80-foot setbacks imposed by the city to protect homes adjacent to the store against glare and glow.

Wal-Mart says the high-pressure lights provide better security and are also more energy-efficient, and would better prevent “light spillage” onto adjacent properties.

It’s not clear at this stage if that’s true. Neighbors have until Aug. 28 to comment on the proposal. City staff is reviewing Wal-Mart’s proposal, said city spokesman Randy Beehler.

Wilma Koski, a member of the West Valley land-use group Neighbors For Responsible Development, doubted a change in the lighting would benefit anyone but Wal-Mart.

“We were assured at the last meeting before the City Council that the lighting issue was dead, that Wal-Mart would never bring it up again,” she said. “Obviously there were several people who lied about that.”

Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Monday, August 13, 2007

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