Pinellas Park Wal-Mart on track for 2001

The Pinellas Park council clears the way for a 230,000-square-foot supercenter to be built on U.S. 19. The store should be open in 2001.

By ANNE LINDBERG

© St. Petersburg Times, published February 27, 2000

PINELLAS PARK -- The third time was the charm for Wal-Mart.

In a 4-0 vote, the Pinellas Park council agreed to a zoning change that cleared the way for the discount giant to build its first supercenter in south Pinellas County. Chuck Williams was absent from Thursday's meeting and so did not cast a vote.

"Hallelujah!" cried Pinellas Park resident Marshall Cook, clapping as the vote concluded. Cook has long pushed both Wal-Mart and the city to open a supercenter in Pinellas Park.

The vote means that Wal-Mart will likely begin construction on the $25- to $30-million project sometime in the final quarter of this year. That would put the store's opening in 2001.

The store will be at 7901 U.S. 19 N, which is occupied by the 12-screen Movies at Pinellas Park and the Drive-In Ministries next door. That's about a half-mile south of the existing store at 8900 U.S. 19 N, which likely will be sold or rented to another retailer.

The main body of the supercenter will take up 220,000 square feet. Including the area of the outdoor garden center and eight-bay auto lube, the entire store will be 230,000 square feet, the largest of Wal-Mart's prototype stores.

A site plan on display in the hallway outside the council chambers showed the main entrance into the parking lot at 80th Avenue N. Near that entrance is a gas station. The store itself will face U.S. 19, with a full-service grocery and bakery on the northern side of the building. The main store will be in the center, with the garden center and auto-lube on the south of structure. Delivery will be in the back, or eastern, portion of the store.

A retention pond wraps around the northeastern portion of the 29 acres. Project engineer David Campbell promised a fountain to help keep the water clear.

Like the existing store, the supercenter will be open 24 hours a day.

Although Wal-Mart had Cook's enthusiastic approval, some of the store's new neighbors were not so sure. It was not that they objected to the supercenter per se. They were worried that Wal-Mart could not be trusted to deliver on its promises to protect them from the noise, traffic and drainage problems the new store could create.

"For personal reasons, I do not support this project," said Ron Stafford, a resident of Golden Gate Mobile Home Community, which abuts the supercenter property toward the north. "I don't trust them."

That mistrust was translated into caution on the part of Mayor Bill Mischler and council member Ed Taylor. They began the public hearing by telling Wal-Mart representatives that they were inclined to favor a zoning that would make a site plan part of the deal. That way, they said, the city could make sure the store provided enough buffering to protect the neighbors.

"We are here, first of all, to protect the residents," Mischler said. "I'm not against this. I'm looking for protection for the people I represent."

Council member Rick Butler disputed that, saying the B1 commercial zoning that Wal-Mart wanted was even more restrictive than the method advocated by Mischler and Taylor. Butler said he predicted that Wal-Mart will have to come before the council again to ask for waivers to allow them to build such a large project. That will give the council additional chances, he said, to make sure neighbors are adequately protected.

Wal-Mart representatives themselves objected to Mischler's and Taylor's suggestion. The site plan that Wal-Mart will propose, they said, exceeds the protections required by the city code for the B1 zoning. They pointed out that most of the property for the new store was already zoned B1, which is the main commercial zoning in the rest of the city.

"If B1 is good enough for most everyone in Pinellas Park," asked Wal-Mart representative Tim Powell, "why isn't it good enough here?"

After a bit more than two hours of public debate, B1 was good enough.

The decision came as a relief to Wal-Mart representatives, who have twice before been defeated when trying to find a site for a supercenter in south Pinellas. Their first attempt came about a year and a half ago in the Lakewood area of St. Petersburg. Their second try was last year in Pinellas Park at the site of the existing store.

Wal-Mart withdrew both proposals after outcry from neighbors and environmentalists who worried about traffic, noise and destruction of protected wetlands.

One reason for Wal-Mart's success this time was the property itself. Most of the 29 acres was already zoned commercial. It was only about 4.5 acres that needed to have its zoning changed from general office to commercial.

But perhaps the biggest reason for its success on this try was the chain's decision to bring its future neighbors into their confidence early in the game.

"We've learned the hard way," Powell, the Wal-Mart representative, said of the company's decision to consult the neighbors in advance. "This one is going pretty smoothly, but the learning curve is taking us a long time to get straight."

Meetings with residents from Golden Gate and Sunset Palms Mobile Home Park produced suggestions that designers say they've included in their site plan, such as deeper buffering and the retention pond fountain.

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