Despite the apparent halt in construction on the site of the future Hydraulic Road Whole Foods, the project is still progressing, says Alan Taylor of Riverbend Management, Inc., a company in the Coran Capshaw empire.
“We’re still working with the city on getting final site plan approval,” he says. “Once we have that, we’ll continue construction again.”
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When the dust settles on the new Whole Foods on Hydraulic Road, will it still resemble this rendering, or might the grocery chain scale down its ambitions? A spokesman refused to comment. |
City Planner Nick Rogers confirms that the city is reviewing the site plan for the project. Since it was first submitted in October 2007, Rogers said the plan has “gone through a pretty thorough review.” Rogers added that the Planning Commission gave the current application preliminary approval after a July 2008 meeting.
Though Taylor says he hopes to receive final approval within the next 60 days, Rogers says he does not know when the city will give final approval.
“It’s difficult to say, so I’d rather not speculate one way or another,” he said. “Each project is different. It depends on how fast we get the plans back, and it depends on the skill of the engineer responding to those comments.”
The city is currently waiting for Riverbend Management to review its most recent comments and resubmit the application, Rogers says.
Regarding the progress of the project, Whole Foods spokesman Fred Shank says, “I really have no updates at this time,” and would not comment on whether the project is still moving forward. In 2007, the grocery chain backed out of an agreement with Albemarle Place developers when that project stalled.
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