This summer’s quiet for the planning board with no meetings between June and October is about to see a radical change. At least three major plans will be on the planning board’s agenda for October.
          “It’s exploded,” Senior Planner Charlie Yokley said about the work on his desk this week – and he added that another stack of plans came in Tuesday.
          The proposal with the most local interest is of course the possible shopping center, Wake Union Place, at the intersection of Wake Union Church Road and Capital Boulevard, once the site of the Parker-Hannifin plant.
          Many people were disappointed when the Wake Forest commissioners voted not to approve the plans for that large shopping center back in December of 2008, basing their decision on traffic considerations. A Wake County Superior Court judge upheld that vote earlier this year, and the developer, Interface Properties of Boca Raton, Fla., has asked for a reversal from the North Carolina Court of Appeals. (Just a note: WRI-Wake Union is also listed as the developer on some plans. A spokesman for Interface said the two entities are essentially the same.)
          Yokley said the current plan on his desk is the same as that proposed in 2008, about two million square feet of retail space if the outparcels are included, with two large anchor stores and several smaller stores. The stores would surround an open square for parking. Two-plus acres on the south side of the tract would be set aside for a Wake Forest Fire Department fire station, the badly needed west-side station and the department’s fourth.
          The traffic design is the difference for this plan. The traffic engineering firm of Ramey Kemp has designed a modified super street in which the reconfigured Wake Union Church Road will intersect with Capital Boulevard at the same location it does now.
          However, traffic leaving the shopping center and Wake Union Church Road will only have the option to turn right onto Capital Boulevard. Drivers who want to travel to the north on Capital or enter the Wake Forest Crossing shopping center (Lowes Foods, Kohl’s) on the east side of Capital would have to go south and make an approved U-turn at a special intersection.
          Yokley said the plan does include two left turn lanes into the shopping center for north-bound traffic on Capital.
          The same restrictions would also apply to drivers entering and leaving Wake Forest Crossing.
          The current plan does not include an extension of Wake Union Church Road to Jenkins Road. That extension was one possibility in 2008.
          The 67-acre site is owned by Wake Forest developer Jim Adams’ company, St. Ives 220 Commercial LLC. In 2006 he purchased the plant and the 30.5 acres vacated in 2002 by Parker-Hannifin, land that had been the site for the town’s original factory, Schrader Bros. Adams paid $2.9 million for a property identified as a brown field site because of TCE contamination in the soil and groundwater, and the complex agreements with state and federal environmental agencies require Parker-Hannifin to continue the removal and remediation, a process that may take another 20 years.
          Adams purchased the land from the Wake Forest Industrial Development Corporation, set up in 1964 to buy the land and build the plant. After fees and other costs, the IDC received $2.2 million, which it delivered to the town, and dissolved itself. That $2.2 million plus interest is the basis for the Futures Fund to encourage economic development in and near the town.
          The 67-acre site includes both the IDC parcels plus adjacent land along Kearney Road that Adams had owned at the time of the IDC purchase. The entire tract has been rezoned to conditional use highway business.
          When the project was first proposed, the estimates were the center would add more than 700 jobs and increase the town’s tax base by $54 million.
ALDI
          Everyone who shops for groceries will be interested in the proposed ALDI grocery store proposed for the left side corner as you enter the Wake Pointe shopping center, heading for Wal-Mart from South Main Street.
          ALDI is a chain of over a thousand stores in 31 states dedicated to providing food at the lowest possible price. It sells its own select brands of groceries and household items. Customers pay a quarter to use a cart but get the quarter back when they return the cart. The stores and the customers save because there are no parking lot cart corrals, no labor in returning the carts to the stores, and almost no parking lot accidents from errant carts.
          The stores are small and compact, but they do sell meats, fruits, vegetables, beer and wine. There are two ALDI stores in Raleigh. Go to http://aldi.us to learn more.
          Yokley said the plan for the store will be on the October planning board agenda.
Richland Creek Plaza
          Sam Watkins and his Ruin Creek Investments from Henderson want to build the Richland Creek Plaza at 999 Durham Road, close to 3 acres directly across from the southern end of Wake Union Church Road.
          The property was owned by Calvin and Madeline Ray, who sold it to the 98 Food Mart. Wake Forest Federal Savings and Loan foreclosed on the property in 2005, and Watkins purchased it in 2008.
          Yokley said the plan calls for a convenience store with gas sales and a flex space in one 6,096-square-foot building and seven flex spaces in the second building of about 14,000 square feet
          Look for this project on the October agenda.
Auto Zone
          Yokley said Auto Zone LLC wants to purchase the former Children’s Adventure Child Development Center (once Total Child of Wake Forest) on South Main Street to build the retail auto care business.
          The 1.25 acres are at 2223 South Main between Taco Bell and Chris Leith Dodge, and the owner is LRT Ventures owned by Robert, Lawrence, Debbie and Thomas Dodd of Raleigh.
          “It may not need board approval, depending on the changes,” Yokley said about this project.
          One of the plans that came to Yokley’s desk this week is for Triple A Auto Care proposed for one of the lots divided from the Growing Child Pediatric medical practice on Capital Boulevard. Triple A, if approved, would be in the front lot along Capital on the left as a driver enters the driveway for Wal-Mart.