More Details Emerge: Plan Commission Sees Walmart Site Plan, Backs Zoning Change

Update: Here is the preliminary site plan for the development. And here is a look at the front of the store, which may change somewhat based on feedback from the Plan Commission.

The South Milwaukee Walmart is one step closer to approval after the Plan Commission voted unanimously Monday to recommend approval of necessary rezoning.

The commission also saw for the first time detailed site and architectural drawings of the store, its parking lot and surroundings.

The meeting lasted approximately one hour and included a number representatives from Walmart presenting and answering questions about building architecture, traffic flow, environmental and other issues. Only a couple of citizens attended, as well as four aldermen.

Some of the “new news” from the meeting:

• Walmart will ask the city for the ability to stay open 24 hours.
• The store would truly be unique in the region. At 115,000 square feet, it would be about 2/3 devoted to general merchandise sales and 1/3 devoted to grocery and pharmacy. A similar store is under construction in Sturgeon Bay.
• The design will be similar to others being built in the area, as Walmart seeks to unify the look and feel of its new developments across the country. However, plan commissioners recommended that Walmart do more to make the front-facing portion of the building more visually appealing. Revised plans will be submitted at the next Plan Commission meeting on Oct. 24.
• The store, like other Walmarts, is likely to include smaller businesses inside it, perhaps a fast food-style restaurant (think: Subway), a bank and vision center.
• The project is expected to generate an average of 6,745 new trips per day — half of those coming and half of those going, according to a traffic study presented at the meeting. Truck traffic would include primarily “local” non-Walmart delivery trucks. Just one or two trucks from the Walmart distribution center would arrive daily and enter off of Davis Avenue.
• The study also showed the need for a traffic signal to be added (at Walmart’s expense) at North Chicago and Badger Avenues. It would be less than 1,000 feet south of the signal at College, but timed to allow for a free flow of traffic.
• Left-turn only lanes would also be striped north and southbound on Chicago, and southbound Chicago would be widened to include a right-turn lane into the Walmart parking lot.
• The outlot planned for the southeast corner of the site will be developed later. A Walmart representative said it could be any number of businesses, but at this point, given the struggles of some restaurant chains in the down economy, it would likely be a strip mall-style development rather than an establishment like Applebee’s or Chili’s.
• Stormwater would be handled through an underground detention system vs. above ground. This is in part due to the tight nature of the site.

The City Council will have to approve the zoning change from its current mix of M-2 manufacturing and C-2 commercial to a Commercial Planned Development District — a designation that gives the city more power to set requirements for the development.

I will post the Walmart renderings when I get them.