Publix site developers give details on project

The realty developers in charge of developing a Publix grocery store and shopping center at the intersection of Highway 84 and John D. Odom Road met with local residents Tuesday night to take feedback on the proposed location.

According to the developers, the shopping center built around Publix will be known as Westway and will contain smaller shops and satellite businesses, similar to other grocery store-anchored shopping centers.

“There are some lots for satellite businesses along Highway 84 and also along John Odom. These are typically used by branch banks, sit-down restuarants, quick-serve restaurants, donut places and coffee places, with a big emphasis on necessity and convenience,” said John Argo, vide president of retail development for Aronov Realty.

Parking won’t be a problem. According to Argo, there will be about 400 parking spaces in the lot between Publix and the satellite businesses.

Several residents living on Sawgrass Drive, which borders the proposed Publix property, expressed concern over Westway’s proximity to their homes and the buffer zone in between.

“There is a buffer area, a heavily landscaped area,” Argo said. “We want to be as good a neighbor as we possibly can be. We’re providing both a natural line of undisturbed buffer, maintain the trees and vegetation 10 feet back, then another additional 40 feet of berm and staggered rows of vegetation on top of the berm.
We’re trying to provide an opaque visual screen, as many visual layers as we can between the neighboring home sites and the shopping center.”

Another point of interest was the planned storm water management pond located next to Westway.

According to Argo, the pond is required by law.

“The runoff this shopping center creates, we have to collect it and store and release it at a slow rate,” Argo said.

Aranov attorney Ed Price said the company will consider residents’ concerns before submitting a proposal to the Dothan Planning Commission by the end of the month.

“It was a good meeting, and this is the reason we had it, to listen to what people had to say, and we’ll see how we can incorporate that,” Price said.