Friday, September 12, 2003
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Friday, September 12, 2003 |
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New restaurant, gym expansion on the way By MICHAEL
BOYLAN
If you are a member of World Gym in Peachtree City or a fan of the Taco Mac restaurants, you have reason to rejoice. Eventually. Cobb and Associates came before the Peachtree City Planning Commission on Monday evening for a workshop discussing a possible multi-building retail and commercial development to be known as Westpark Promenade. The center, which will be 3.6 acres, will be located between Southern Community Bank and the Hampton Inn. It will feature a two-story World Gym with 28,000 total square feet, a 5,000-square-foot Taco Mac and four 1,500-square-foot retail shops. Taco Mac is a popular restaurant chain that started in the Virginia Highlands area of Atlanta in 1979 and has grown exponentially since then. The restaurant is best known for its buffalo wings and extensive selection of bottled and draft beer. The plan for the property will contain 39,000 square feet of retail and commercial space and parking for 162 vehicles. That is where the red flags came up. In the past several meetings, members of the Planning Commission have been very outspoken about their dislike of lots of parking spaces. Chairman Dennis Payton told the developers proposing the Target at Kedron that he finds many developers plan parking for the two weeks before Christmas and then the majority of spaces go unused for the rest of the year. Dar Thompson, owner of the World Gym, felt that the proposed number of parking spaces wasn't excessive, though, considering the number of members he has and expects to have by the time the doors to the new building are ready to open. "We have expanded five times in the past five years," said Thompson, who expects to have 4,000 members some time in the near future. He also cited the parking problems that the Gold's Gym on Ga. Highway 74 has experienced because they have a lot of members and not enough parking spaces for peak times during the day. Commission member Wes Saunders agreed with Thompson, stating that he had seen the parking problems there and did not think the parking projections for the proposed development were too farfetched. Payton suggested a form of pervious parking that allowed for more spaces but did not add to runoff problems. As it stands on the initial plan, the only entrance to the development is off Commerce Drive. This caused the commission to mention the problems they had with how cars would be driving around the parking lot. They also had concerns with the screening of the backs of the retail shop. City planner David Rast cited his concerns near the end of the meeting, echoing the previous concerns about parking, screening of the parking lot from Hwy. 74 and landscaping in front of the stores. Cobb and Associates will now go back and try to incorporate the Planning Commission's suggestions into a workable plan. They will then come back before the commission and try to get their conceptual site plan approved. If approved, they can start building the development and eventually, people will be able to work out in a new gym and then have dinner at Taco Mac.
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