The past couple weeks have seen plenty of stories describing ways in which Wal-Mart has mobilized to aid the Gulf Coast in preparation and relief efforts during hurricane season.
It seems, however, that even though the corporation was making efforts to lessen the blow of the storm, they still haven’t lost sight of the bottom-line. In a story posted yesterday in The Examiner, Wal-Mart was accused of price-gouging gasoline at one of their stations along an evacuation route in Southeast Texas. The Wal-Mart/Murphy USA located on U.S. 69 in Lumberton raised their price of gasoline a total of 12 cents in the day leading up to the evacuation for Hurricane Gustav, then another 10 cents when the evacuation was announced.
These prices were NOT consistent with other gas-stations in the area and following the storm, prices dropped again to reflect market prices. And despite a gas station manager claiming that prices went up because of a “gas price rise”, the cost of oil per barrel dropped over each of the three days.
Evacuation Gas Game [The Examiner (Texas)]:
In the days and hours leading to the potential call for a mandatory evacuation for Southeast Texas residents the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) blasted across its electronic billboard alert system that a hurricane was coming and residents needed to fill up their tanks with gasoline.
According to a local wholesale fuel provider, most everyone heeded TxDOT’s advice, but The Examiner also kept close watch on one gasoline retailer located along the main evacuation route from Southeast Texas.
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Posted by Luke West | Permalink
Miami has always been a city on the verge, and it’s never quite clear whether it will embrace greatness or mediocrity. Drive up Biscayne Boulevard, a street with the potential for beauty and dignity, and you can see both possibility and stupidity—whole blocks given over to fast-food franchises, sprawling corner gas stations and more. It somehow seems like a high-stakes game of Mother-May-I, with baby steps forward and a giant step back.
But no backward step is bigger than the one the city is confronting now, a Wal-Mart next to the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, on parking lots still owned by The Miami Herald with a sale expected to be consummated next year. Of all the bad ideas ever proffered for downtown Miami, this is the worst.
And shockingly so in a time and a place where we have already invested more than $500 million (counting the Arsht Center and the preliminary work on Museum Park) in public funds to create a downtown cultural precinct.
SEEKING URBANITY
At a time and in a place where we should be seeking to create urbanity, a Wal-Mart—even the nicest superstore ever built—would mean instant squalor.
Big-box stores may be a fact of suburban and—in far too many places—small-town life; they may be a fact of economic life. But a big-box store does not belong on this prime urban site. For decades, the civic and cultural leadership of Miami has worked to create what is still an emerging downtown cultural precinct.
The public investment in the Arsht Center is nearing $500 million (and this is not small change by any way of accounting); another $200 million in public funds is aimed at new buildings for the Miami Art Museum and the Miami Science Museum with further significant investment in improving Museum Park. Four condominium towers in varying stages of completion look out over the future park, ultimately prime locations for lovers of the arts and sciences. What is missing from the equation is the urban context—the street-level amenities that would lead one to walk a few blocks to a restaurant and the theater or lunch and an exhibition—to wit, urbanism.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Group Mobilizes to Fight Cordova Wal-Mart [Memphis Daily News (Tenn.)]
It’s an old story, and it generally follows the same set of events: Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, pursues a piece of real estate that catches its interest. Opponents of the retail giant gather their forces, develop an organized campaign and attempt to stop the development of a new store in its tracks.
Sometimes Wal-Mart loses. Many times it doesn’t. But there is always another piece of land on which to build another store.
In Cordova, that oft-repeated turn of events is roughly at the midway point. Several nonprofit and community activist groups have banded together under one name and for the purpose of presenting a united front in fighting a planned 151,908-square-foot Wal-Mart Supercenter coming to Cordova.
Taking a standThe new group calls itself Citizens for Sustainable Growth and is comprised of groups including the Grays Creek Association, Cordova Leadership Council and Parents and Friends of Macon Hall Elementary School. At the moment, the approval process for the sleek new Wal-Mart store, which will carry the retail chain’s new logo, is in a state of suspended animation.
And the new grassroots activist group is using that to its advantage.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Big-boxes, Wal-Mart continue to eye ‘underserved’ downtown Miami [Miami Today (Fla.)]
With more residents gravitating toward city centers to live closer to work, big-box retailers have begun eyeing urban areas in hopes they’ll find new customers in these downtown dwellers, experts say.
The dragging economy has led some to scale down expansion plans as shoppers pull back on spending, but Wal-Mart is in growth mode and gunning for a downtown Miami location.
The national big-box chain is considering the planned City Square retail project at 431-1451 N Bayshore Drive and 425 NE 13th St., according to Wal-Mart spokeswoman Michelle Azel Belaire and Miami Commissioner Marc Sarnoff.
But the store is keeping its options open, Ms. Azel Belaire said.
Wal-Mart has also looked into the Omni mall complex on Biscayne Boulevard, now under renovation and set to open in 2010 with 270,000 square feet of retail.
“Wal-Mart has contacted us, but we really don’t see it as a fit for our project,” said Aaron J. Butler, a leasing broker with Comras Co., which represents the retail portion of the Omni. He declined to say why.
Still, Wal-Mart’s efforts to secure space downtown are ongoing.
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Posted by Tony Calero | Permalink
Aug13
MUTINY IN VENICE, FL?
Venice Wal-Mart project gets the critics on its side [Herald Tribune (Fla.)]
In a stunning reversal, neighborhood groups that for nearly a year fought Mike Miller’s 73-acre Wal-Mart Renaissance project on east Laurel Road showed up at Tuesday’s City Council meeting to urge its approval.
After four hours of nothing but positive comments from residents, business leaders, city staff and Council members, the Council did just that and approved the project unanimously.
Miller made a number of changes since Wal-Mart first proposed building a 200,000- square-foot store, which the Planning Commission denied last fall. The Council was scheduled to hear Miller’s appeal of that denial and another issue by neighboring residents of the Venetian Golf and River Club, but both sides announced they had reached an agreement before the Council took up the issue Tuesday.
After a brief recess so City Attorney Bob Anderson could review the agreement and figure out how the Council needed to consider the issue, the Council took up the Renaissance project.
Miller agreed to 10 stipulations that included widening Laurel Road from two to four lanes in front of the development. He also agreed to: add more landscape buffering and a higher berm so the retail store was less visible from Laurel Road; move a park closer to the project’s eastern border with Willow Chase subdivision; create a faux main street with varying roofing pitches and building colors that cloak the big-box store look; add more sidewalks throughout the project and work with an advisory group of residents as outparcels of the project come forward for council approval.
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Posted by Tony Calero | Permalink
North Lauderdale: City wants Wal-Mart to speed building of store [Sun Sentinel (Fla.)]
City officials want a Super Wal-Mart, even if they have to go to Arkansas to get it.
The city plans to send a letter to Wal-Mart requesting a meeting with the company at their corporate headquarters. At a City Commission meeting last month, Mayor Jack Brady and City Manager Richard Sala both were authorized to attend.
Plans for the store on the south side of McNab Road have been in the works for about two years. Wal-Mart was slated to be the anchor for a proposed 43-acre Town Center with 36,000 square feet of retail space.
The city originally wanted Wal-Mart to find other tenants to fill the center, but after project delays and the economic downturn, Brady said the city needs the center built as soon as possible.
“If it sounds like we’re begging, we are,” he said. “We need the money. It’ll generate tax dollars.”
Posted by Tony Calero | Permalink
Wal-Mart about to get get key approval for Alachua store [High Springs Herald (Fla.)]
The final state permit for a proposed Wal-Mart Supercenter in Alachua is being reviewed and is close to being approved, a Florida Department of Transportation official said.
The FDOT is “getting closer to issuing a notice of intent,” according to FDOT spokesperson Gina Busscher.
“It’s definitely moving forward,” Busscher said.
A notice of intent is issued by the FDOT as a placeholder for the actual final permit which will be issued after Wal-Mart gains all necessary permits from the city of Alachua, Busscher said. The notice of intent is valid for one year.
On July 24, Wal-Mart’s engineering firm submitted comments on the final remaining concerns of the FDOT, Busscher said.
Some of the points still being discussed include: coordinating the traffic signals in the area, further studying turn lanes and modifying the Northbound Interstate 75 offramp, Busscher said.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Commission OKs Wal-Mart plat [Augusta Chronicle (Ga.)]
A proposed Wal-Mart shopping center near Grovetown came a step closer to realization Thursday with the Columbia County Planning Commission approving a preliminary plat for the project.
The shopping center will be constructed on about 61 acres in an area many officials call “The Gateway,” which is north of Grovetown near the intersection of Lewiston Road and Interstate 20. The proposed center is referred to as the Wal-Mart Gateway project on county documents.
The project calls for 13 tracts on the property, with one going to Wal-Mart. No details on who might build on the remaining tracts were available Thursday evening.
Though planning commissioners approved the preliminary plat, they did place conditions on developers: buffers and landscaping must be installed adjacent to any properties zoned residential, a final plat must be submitted for approval and tracts on the property zoned light industrial and residential must be rezoned commercial before they are developed. A time frame for the Wal-Mart project has not been released.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Our Busiest Intersection [Highlands Today (Fla.)]
The Avon Park Wal-Mart will open next week. So, will traffic get better in front of the Sebring Wal-Mart?
The short answer is no, according to Highlands County Planner Don Hanna.
“It ain’t going to happen. That’s what the traffic models show,” Hanna said. “We’re growing in too many places.”
County Engineer Ramon Gavarrete agrees. He expects a temporary 10 percent decrease. Residents who live near College Drive will probably choose the Avon Park Wal-Mart, as will people who live along State Road 64. “Sun ‘n Lake, they’re the ones with an either-or decision to make.”
Still Getting Bigger
Highlands County growth has slowed considerably in the past year, but the University of Florida’s Bureau of Economic and Business Research nevertheless estimates a current summer population of 97,000 people and a winter census of 117,000. Hanna has used those numbers to predict 159,000 permanent and temporary residents by 2020.
The Wal-Mart section of U.S. 27, from Bayview Street to Schumacher Road, was designated by a March 2007 traffic study as the busiest intersection in Highlands County.
The maximum volume should be 3,980 vehicles per hour, at peak hours, according to Florida Department of Transportation.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Traffic Light For New Wal-Mart Months Away [Highlands Today (Fla.)]
After Avon Park is welcomed to Wal-Mart next week, expect more cars and traffic to congest U.S. 27 North near the new Supercenter.
Don’t worry about sitting at a red light in the middle of rush hour at Shop 16 Road, however, because the traffic light is not coming for at least another six months, County Engineer Ramon Gavarrete said. The Florida Department of Transportation would not approve it before the store opened.
“I can tell you we’re going to need that signal the first day that Wal-Mart is open, but (Florida) DOT has (its) own policies,” Gavarrete said. “If this would have been 100 percent on county roads, I would have approved that signal immediately.”
According to Gavarrete, Avon Park, the county and Wal-Mart all agreed to have a traffic light installed at that intersection at Wal-Mart’s expense before the Bentonville, Ark., corporation broke ground at the site, but since U.S. 27 is state-owned, it’s not up to Gavarrete or the city to approve the light.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
East Albany Walmart one step closer [WALB-TV (Ga.)]
Plans for a new Walmart in East Albany continue to move forward. Walmart plans to close the deal on property at the intersection of Cordele Road and Clark Avenue in East Albany in about six months.
Tuesday, city commissioners tentatively approved a road improvement incentive for the development.
The developer will pay for about $800,000 worth of road improvements, including entrances and exits to the property; then, the city and county will reimburse the developer.
Planning Director Howard Brown said, “The genius of this is that the city and county will not pay one dime, until the actual building is built and receives a certificate of occupancy from the planning and development department.”
City commissioners say $800,000 is a drop in the bucket compared to the $3.3 to $4.5 Million in taxes the new Walmart would provide the county. It’s also expected to add up to 500 jobs.
Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Wal-Mart seeking several variances [Eufaula Tribune (Ala.)]
Members of the Eufaula Board of Zoning Adjustments will spend much of their time talking about Wal-Mart today.
An official with Sain Associates, which is working with Wal-Mart on the planned project, is coming to today’s zoning board meeting to request several variances. Those requests include:
An area variance to exceed the width limitation for street access at the new store. While the current zoning ordinance limits street access, i.e. driveways, to 30 feet in width where the driveway intersects a public street, the applicant is proposing two points of access adjoining U.S. Highway 431 that would exceed 30 feet.
The south access, which would be 60 feet wide, would include five lanes and provide ingress/egress for the supercenter and any future development on the adjoining 30 acres. The road will be a public street. The north access, 36 feet wide, would consist of three lanes and provide ingress/egress for the store and other commercial uses. It will remain a private street.
An area variance to exceed the number of street access points allowed. While the current ordinance only allows two per lot on any public street, the store is seeking three access points, with one mainly dedicated to large trucks.
An area variance to reduce parking space length from 19 feet to 18 feet at the new store.
An area variance to reduce the number of loading spaces required from nine to four.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Civic Group Opposes Wal-Mart On Gandy [Tampa Tribune (Fla.)]
Mildred McFadden has lived on Pearl Avenue since 1960. She loves the tree-lined street, her generous lot and the community.
The traffic, though, is something she could live without.
McFadden’s house sits on a stretch between Lois Avenue and Dale Mabry Highway that has become a favorite cut-through for drivers avoiding Gandy Boulevard.
“I think everyone in Tampa knows where Pearl Avenue is,” McFadden said during a July 29 public meeting on the ongoing Gandy widening project. “I’m really, really tired of the traffic.”
With a Wal-Mart Supercenter set to open in her neighborhood, McFadden worries the 24-hour store will bring traffic and possibly crime.
“I hope Wal-Mart dies and goes away,” McFadden said.
She joined others in the Gandy/Sun Bay South Civic Association in taking a formal stand against the Wal-Mart project at the association’s July meeting.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Wal-Mart could find needed pal on Hernando County Commission [St. Petersburg Times (Fla.)]
When the County Commission denied Wal-Mart’s plans to build a supercenter off Barclay Avenue in May 2007, it was the fall of a Goliath.
Considering the open-armed, even gleeful, welcoming of previous Wal-Marts to Hernando County, such a stunning turnabout was hard to figure. You couldn’t help but wonder how the politics in the county had changed so quickly and drastically.
Wal-Mart fatigue no doubt played a part.
By last year, the retailer operated three supercenters in the county and a Sam’s Club wholesale outlet. More seemed likely as the company pursued a relentless (since abandoned) expansion policy called saturation marketing.
Also, the site on Barclay, though zoned for retail use, was less than ideal — too close to schools and subdivisions such as Pristine Place, the residents of which crammed the commission chambers on the day of the vote.
What else? Well, as I watched that meeting, it struck me that the company had no power base in Hernando County.
Its lawyers were from Tampa. Not a single member of the local business community spoke in favor of the store. The commissioner who may be most closely allied with that community, David Russell, took the unusual step of saying he planned to vote against the store even before the meeting.
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Posted by Tony Calero | Permalink
WILDOMAR: “Fighting” for a Wal-Mart Supercenter [The Californian]
City officials and members of the business community are lobbying Wal-Mart to revive plans for building a supercenter near the Bundy Canyon Road/Interstate 15 interchange.
A supercenter features a full-service grocery store and all the products stocked at a regular Wal-Mart ---- clothing, tools, electronics, toiletries and more ---- under one roof.
Based in Bentonville, Ark., Wal-Mart owns about 25 acres of land near the southeastern corner of the interchange and the company was moving forward with the construction of a new supercenter there as recently as spring 2005.
Those plans were shelved, however, when the company decided in fall 2007 to scale back on building new stores, said Wal-Mart spokesman John Mendez.
Wildomar City Councilwoman Sheryl Ade said Monday that a new market-study matrix developed by Wal-Mart shows the area might not be able to support a supercenter. She said Wildomar missed the cutoff by a couple of percentage points.
The results of that new study haven’t stopped her, however, from pitching Wildomar directly to the company’s board of directors as a great spot for a new store.
Ade said she has sent a letter to the board, lobbying them to take into consideration how the new supercenter would affect financing for the city, which incorporated July 1 after voters approved it in February.
When county officials were looking at putting the question of incorporating on the ballot, a fiscal study was produced that approximated the budget for a then-hypothetical city of Wildomar.
Included in that study was $450,000 in sales tax revenue that was directly attributed to a new Wal-Mart.
City Councilwoman Bridgette Moore said the author of the fiscal study, Gary Thompson, produced an alternate version of the study that showed Wildomar’s budget would be OK without the $450,000.
“We don’t need Wal-Mart to succeed,” she said.
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Posted by Tony Calero | Permalink
Surf City could get new Wal-Mart [Jacksonville Daily News (N.C.)]
A commercial development company has met with the Surf City planning department several times regarding property for a Wal-Mart in the town.
Surf City Mayor Zander Guy confirmed that representatives from the real estate development firm Lauth, headquartered in Indianapolis, with a regional office in Charlotte, have been in “constant contact” with the town’s planning department during the last couple of months. The firm, which specializes in building office, industrial, health care and retail properties, is seeking about 150 acres of property for a Wal-Mart.
“Lauth representatives are still doing their due diligence - we don’t have anything concrete at this time,” Guy said. The firm, however, has checked on water and sewer availability and has made a sewer allocation request for 50,000 gallons a day.
“They have also presented the planning department with preliminary site plans,” Guy said.
Guy said though the developer has yet to make a formal commitment to build a store in Surf City, he believes the likely location will be on an undeveloped tract of land at the intersection of U.S. 17 and N.C. 210.
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Posted by Tony Calero | Permalink
Wal-Mart to Expand South Lakeland Store Into a Supercenter [The Ledger (Fla.)]
The South Lakeland Wal-Mart is getting a Supercenter upgrade.
The store, 3501 S. Florida Ave., will be expanded by 21,000 square feet and converted into a Supercenter with a full-scale supermarket, spokeswoman Quenta Vettel said.
The project also includes a new facade and is scheduled for completion in fall 2009. The revamped store, which first opened in 1985, will measure 148,000 square feet.
“It’s just going in remodeling, renovating, adding some square feet and bringing the grocery component,” Vettel said. “When at all possible and the market warrants it, we’re trying to take all of our Discount stores and upgrade them into Supercenters. It’s certainly something the company has been doing over the past few years to have all those services under one roof.”
Lakeland has just one existing Supercenter, at 5800 U.S. 98 N. Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal Mart Stores operates a total seven Supercenters in Polk County, in addition to two Sam’s Club locations in Lakeland.
In addition to general merchandise, Supercenter locations typically feature fresh meats and produce, deli sections and other supermarket amenities.
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Posted by Tony Calero | Permalink
In Wal-Mart’s wake [Gainesville Sun (Fla.)]
Ask residents of the Pine Ridge neighborhood what they think of the new Wal-Mart Supercenter now at the northern edge of their subdivision and the response might surprise you.
“It’s about time,” said Robert Mobley, 83, as he chatted with a neighbor on NE 8th Avenue.
“It’s years overdue,” said Effie McClellan, 71, whose house overlooks Wal-Mart’s retention pond.
Both residents say their part of town — northeast Gainesville — has more than its fair share of problems and less than its fair share of resources.
In a neighborhood where about 43 percent of the residents live below the federal poverty level, the arrival of a large retail store was seen as an answer to the economic woes of a blighted area.
But what impact has the store had on the community since opening in May, and will other developments follow?
“It was very timely, when you look at how gas prices now have increased,” said Scherwin Henry, who represents the surrounding district on the Gainesville City Commission. “Those who live in the eastern part of the community are actually able to do business within the community, rather than having to travel outside of the community to shop.”
McClellan agrees: “It’s something in the community that hasn’t been here for years and years.”
She is a little concerned about the increased traffic that now runs in front of her house. It used to be a quite community street but is temporarily accommodating the city bus route, she said.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
Wal-Mart Coming To Downtown Miami? [Local 10 (Fla.)]
The city of Miami is considering allowing mega-retail giant Wal-mart to build in downtown Miami. But some residents said the discount super store would be quite a contrast next to the Performing Arts Center and million-dollar condos in the area.
“If you are going to have commercial establishments, choose shops that are good for a neighborhood with a performing arts center,” said Venetian Causeway Neighborhood Alliance President Barbara Bisno. “Wal-Mart doesn’t have that ring to it.”
Bisno said her main concern is not the Wal-Mart brand, but the traffic the store could bring.
Commissioner Marc Sacrnoff said the added traffic congestion could also cause “some serious” damage to the new brick pavement the city spent millions to install.
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Posted by Tony Calero | Permalink
Shoppers support Wal-Mart expansion [Herald Tribune (Fla.)]
Norma See said plans to make the Wal-Mart at Lockwood Ridge Road and University Parkway a Supercenter would create more traffic, but to her, it would be worth it.
Although the area is home to three other food stores, a new Wal-Mart Supercenter, with groceries offered in addition to other goods, would give cost-conscious shoppers an incentive to brave the congested roads, she said.
“It may be slightly more traffic, but people that come here will still come anyway” to get the low prices at Wal-Mart, said See, a Sarasota resident.
The Manatee County Planning Commission on Thursday approved plans for the addition to the Wal-Mart and for a new Walgreens that will replace an older Walgreens in the same plaza.
A Fashion Bug and several nearby empty stores will be demolished to make way for the additions that will bring 55,684 square feet of new retail space to the plaza on the northwest corner of Lockwood Ridge Road and University Parkway.
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Posted by Joel Nezianya | Permalink
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