Published: September 29, 2007 11:43 pm      

TOWN OF LOCKPORT: Wal-Mart hearing set for Tuesday

TOWN OF LOCKPORT — SUPERCENTER: Plan for

mall site being presented again, ahead of expected town voting.

By Joyce M. Miles

milesj@gnnewspaper.com

TOWN OF LOCKPORT — The public is invited to weigh in, again, on the Wal-Mart question Tuesday night.

In a formal public hearing at 7 p.m., the town planning board will re-present Wal-Mart’s proposal to build a supercenter at the Lockport Mall property.

The required hearing was held last year, but after a succeeding, lengthy gap in town-corporate communications, Wal-Mart asked for, and the planning board agreed to host, another one.

“The board thought it made sense because it’s been out of the public eye,” attorney Dan Seaman said. “We’re not looking for repetition, but everybody will be given a chance to speak.”

Wal-Mart appears on the verge of getting the town’s permission to erect a supercenter at the mall site after several years of on-and-off pursuit and protracted public debate. According to town planner Drew Reilly, Wal-Mart representatives will present the company’s proposed site plan, and members of the public will be able to comment again on its effects.

Afterward, it will be up to the planning board whether to approve the site plan, grant a required special use permit and allow subdivision of the mall lot, where current owner General Growth intends to hold on to Bon-Ton and share some of the premises with Wal-Mart. Then the zoning board can go to work deciding whether to grant variances — exceptions to local zoning code — that would allow Wal-Mart to finally build.

The Wal-Mart/General Growth sharing arrangement is what’s generating some of the procedural wrangling faced by the planning and zoning boards, according to Reilly. A longstanding question about exactly how many variances the two property owners will require is still being sorted out.

Wal-Mart attorney Leslie Senglaub did not return a call for comment.

Reilly on Friday reiterated his stance that the project will not require 42 variances as has been reported. Once duplicative elements of business zoning and Commercial Corridor Overlay District codes are narrowed, and if the planning board agrees to waive some stricter requirements of the overlay district, the public will find the number of exceptions being granted is greatly reduced, he said.

“In the end, there really is only a handful of meaningful variances (required),” he said.

Of the variances, about half will be needed by Wal-Mart and half by General Growth because of subdivision. Each business is supposed to have certain setbacks, parking minimums and the like. Bon-Ton and Wal-Mart would be side-by-side, however, and Wal-Mart can’ meet all the requirements and still have its site plan work.

“These are the no-brainer variances,” Reilly said.

More variances can be eliminated if the planning board agrees to waive or modify certain requirements of the overlay district code, which was written to impose some aesthetic order on South Transit Road.

For instance, Reilly said, the overlay district requires a storefront to have 25 percent windows. Wal-Mart argued it can’t install more than 17 percent because of the way the interior is arranged. Another overlay requirement, limiting access to/from the road to one curb cut, should be lifted because a business of Wal-Mart’s size ought to have two. Traffic would be snarled otherwise, he said.

The point of the public hearing is for the planning board to receive public input on the site plan before making a final decision about approving it, the special use permit and the subdivision application.

Planning board action is not likely Tuesday but it is expected within the next 30 days, Seaman said.

The planning board’s next formal meeting is Oct. 16. The Zoning Board of Appeals will meet Oct. 23.

Contact reporter Joyce Miles at 439-9222, ext. 6245.ᶖ