Following the outpouring of community concern on both OWDNA and WHHNA listservs, including several letters already sent to Harris Teeter about lack of consideration for the neighborhood character, today's Herald Sun picked up the story (reprinted after the break). The bottom line is that Erwin Square Developers as well as Harris Teeter representatives are stonewalling. Nobody can be reached for comment. But, in a curious development, the HT sign that was previously displayed on the corner of Ninth Street and W. Markham has been taken down. I posted the picture of the sign here.
If we as a community want to be successful in changing Harris Teeter's attitude toward the site, we must maintain -- and increase -- the pressure by continuing to write letters, posting on their facebook page, and reaching out to our elected representatives. One would think Harris Teeter would not want to alienate their customer base before their store even opens.
Ninth Street, under the wire
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| 1 | | loleniacz@heraldsun.com; 419-6636
DURHAM — Proposals for construction of a new grocery store and a bank off Ninth Street have sparked debate among business and neighborhood group leaders, who say the projects skirted new area development regulations.
The Durham City-County Planning Department received site plans for the two proposals in November, said planning director Steve Medlin, before the City Council voted in January to approve new development regulations for the Ninth Street area. The previous requirements apply to the plans, he said.
One of the site plans shows a 53,365-square-foot grocery store, a Harris Teeter, on a vacant lot off Hillsborough Road near its intersection with Ninth Street. The other shows a proposed bank building with drive-through lanes on a parking lot that has been leased by the City of Durham for public parking.
Officials with the development groups behind the site plans declined comment, or could not be reached for comment for this story.
A Harris Teeter spokeswoman said in an email on Wednesday that it’s against corporate policy to “discuss stores unless we are currently operating at the location, or have executed a lease for a future site.”
Terry Sanford Jr., a property owner representative, said Wednesday that the land off Hillsborough Road is under contract “and that’s about all I can tell you.”
Steve Medlin, director of Durham City-County Planning, said it’s his understanding that the developers behind the Harris Teeter project see it as a more “shovel-ready” project that could be developed in the near-term, while the proposed bank is a project that’s “more fluid without a specific user yet signed on.”
Durham City Manager Tom Bonfield said he believes the site plan for the bank was submitted so development officials could keep their “options open.”
Either way, the site plans are moving forward in the approval process. The review has already begun for the site plan for the grocery store, Medlin said, and the plan is likely to go to the Development Review Board for final approval on March 16, he said.
For the proposed bank, Medlin can approve the site plan administratively once all comments and corrections are made.
Site plan approvals are technical administrative approvals, Medlin said, so that if the plans meet the required standards, they must be approved as a matter of law.
Tom Miller, a Watts Hospital-Hillandale Neighborhood Association representative, said in an email that neighborhood leaders were “not enthusiastic” about the grocery store plan.
Miller said he believes it would be a “good thing” if the developers would propose a new store design that complies with the new Ninth Street area regulations, but he also said that previous attempts to find a compromise weren’t successful.
“Our attempts to find some way to alter the regulations to compromise (Harris Teeter’s) wishes with the district concept proposed in the Ninth Street Plan came to nothing,” Miller said. “The developer chose instead to vest its ability to develop under the old regulations by filing a site plan before the new regulations were adopted.”
For the bank proposal, Miller said neighborhood leaders weren’t aware that the project was under consideration until after the site plan was filed, and he also said the development differs from the Ninth Street Plan vision and new regulations.
“We don’t take a position on a project without details, and we never saw a site plan until after it was submitted to the planning department,” said Brett Walters, a representative for the Old West Durham Neighborhood Association.
Walters added that the association was a supporter of the Ninth Street Plan and worked to push for the adoption of the new regulations that were framed in that plan, and said they include greater protections for area development — except for “last minute site plans.”
Tom Campbell, co-owner of The Regulator Bookshop on Ninth, said he doesn’t believe the grocery store, as shown in the site plan, fits the surrounding development. He described the store as shown as a “a kind of suburban-style, large grocery store, surrounded by a sea of parking.”
Campbell also said he doesn’t know that a bank is inappropriate for the area, but he is concerned that if the project that’s proposed in the plan is completed, it could take away parking from existing Ninth Street businesses.
“There’s been no communication that I know of with the business owners on this side of the street, and I’m quite concerned that if that went forward, it would have a devastating effect on the businesses on Ninth Street because it would take away all the parking,” Campbell said.
Bonfield said there’s a proposal expected to come before the City Council in about a month for a parking study that would include all of downtown, as well as the Ninth Street area. The study would look at plans for new development as well as existing development and would make recommendations for parking solutions, he said.
Read more: The Herald-Sun - Ninth Street under the wire
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