HOW TO GO
WHAT: Blue Ash-based Silverman and Company Inc. recently resubmitted a request to change 35 acres zoned for residential use to Commercial Planned Unit Development to include a 133,000-square-foot grocery store at the intersection of Tylersville and Princeton Glendale roads.
WHEN: 6:30 p.m. Monday, Jan. 27
WHERE: West Chester Administration Building, 9113 Cincinnati-Dayton Road
MORE INFO: www.westchesteroh.org
A developer is continuing its quest to build a shopping center that would include Ohio’s second-largest Kroger Marketplace.
Blue Ash-based Silverman and Company Inc. recently resubmitted a request to change 35 acres zoned for residential use to Commercial Planned Unit Development to include a 133,000-square-foot grocery store at the intersection of Tylersville and Princeton Glendale roads.
The first phase of Crossings of Beckett shopping center would include the store with a bank and a pharmacy with drive-through access, a Fred Meyer Jewelers, a small medical clinic, a Kroger fuel center, an additional 15,000 square feet of retail space alongside Kroger and three additional out-parcels along Ohio 747.
Details of the potential development were first outlined in late 2012 to the five-member commission. Residents railed against the development, citing concerns of light, noise and odor pollution, along with increased traffic. Silverman and Company withdrew the proposed zoning change after the commission suggested denial.
The second phase of development initially included six additional parcels of land — three along Ohio 747 and three along Tylersville Road — and a 5.83-acre development parcel.
Changes to the plan eliminate the three parcels on the north side of the site and call for the creation of a buffer for residents to the north, according to Tim Burgoyne, Silverman and Company Inc.’s director of site acquisition and development.
That buffer would convert five acres along Tylersville Road to green space, with trees, mounds, two ponds and a meandering walkway.
“The residents wanted nothing along there, so after meeting with the community and staff members and getting everyone’s input, we believe that we have substantially addressed their concerns and we’re excited to move forward,” Burgoyne said.
The new zoning change request will be presented at a 6:30 p.m. Jan. 27 meeting of the West Chester Zoning Commission at the West Chester Administration Building, 9113 Cincinnati-Dayton Road.
Jane and Barry Hood of Wethersfield Drive, residents since 1989, said they remain against the plan because they are concerned about increased traffic, the safety of children attending nearby Lakota Freshman School and the value of area homes.
“There’s a whole field across the street there. I don’t know why they couldn’t build it across the street on the other side of (Ohio) 747,” Jane Hood said.
Tom Kees of Brantford Court, a resident since 1998, said he is against the development for the same reasons cited by the Hood family but also because of it being so close to his property.
“Most of us are against it just because you’ll see it right there,” he said, gesturing from the front of his home toward the site of the proposed development. “I would rather see houses in there but we’re not going to stop it. I was here when it (four-lane Ohio 747) was a two-lane highway and that subdivision over there wasn’t there.”
Willa Averette of Desert Springs Court, a resident since 2000, said she turned out in 2012 to oppose the plan. She said those attending the Jan. 27 zoning commission hearing should be prepared to listen.
“I think as a total community we need to determine (a solution) because someone is going to come there and develop,” Averette said. “What do we want our community to be? We need to approach Kroger and give them a discussion instead of walking blindly thinking we can stop everybody from doing anything.”
Burgoyne said Silverman and Company commissioned a traffic study now approved by the Ohio Department of Transportation and the Butler County Engineer’s Office.
“They had three small conditions, all of which we agreed to,” Burgoyne said “We think any concerns for traffic have adequately been addressed. It satisfied ODOT and it satisfies Butler County.”
Those conditions include installing a traffic light before the grocery store opens, implementing road improvements before it opens and prohibiting motorists from turning left onto Ohio 747 from the northern access point when exiting the site.
If the Kroger Marketplace is developed, The Kroger Co. would vacate its nearby 71,000-square-foot location at Ohio 747 and Smith Road in the Beckett Commons shopping center, according to Kroger spokeswoman Rachael Betzler.
“Currently that store is very busy,” Betzler said. “We have heavy traffic (inside the store) and it’s really just busting at the seams and we really need a lot more space to give our customers a better shopping experience. ”
If plans move forward, the Kroger Marketplace would be the second such store in Butler County and the state’s second largest. Ohio’s largest Kroger Marketplace is the 147,000-square-foot store in Centerville.
Kroger, when it owns a site, will typically wait until it finds a non-grocery related use before selling it. The company closed a location on the corner of Hamilton-Mason and Cincinnati-Dayton roads in Liberty Twp. in 2006 when it opened a Kroger Marketplace less than half a mile north of the site.
The former location sat vacant until March 2010, when The Web Extreme Entertainment opened there.
Because Kroger does not own that location, the owners of the shopping center would be free to pursue a grocery-related use for the site.
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