City notified Thursday of withdrawal for S74 rezoning

A commercial development company has withdrawn its bid for a controversial commercial rezoning on the south end of Ga. Highway 74 near Holly Grove Road for what would have been a 300,000 sq. ft. shopping center with a large home improvement store and a large soft goods store.

If it had ultimately been approved, the limited use commercial rezoning would have combined with the existing Wilshire Pavilion shopping center across the highway to become the largest commercial area in Peachtree City.

The rezoning was in trouble several weeks ago when Columbia Properties asked the City Council to table the matter until the June 7 meeting. A request to withdraw the matter from consideration entirely was hand-delivered to City Hall Thursday, said City Spokesperson Betsy Tyler.

City staff had recommended that the parcel be rezoned for commercial use just along the highway in the area the developer is seeking smaller outparcel stores, but remain zoned for light industrial use on the remainder of the property, where the large retail stores were to be located.

The city’s planning commission has also recommended that the rezoning not be approved.

The home improvement store was proposed to be 138,000 sq. ft. and the entire development was to total 216,000 sq. ft. not including several retail outparcel lots along Hwy. 74. Normally both figures would have triggered restrictions in the city’s big box ordinance that would require a special waiver from the City Council. But in this case the developer sought a limited use commercial rezoning, and the big box ordinance does not apply to that zoning district.

The city’s land use plan calls for the site to be developed with a medium density single family subdivision, so Columbia’s proposal for a shopping center doesn’t mesh, City Planner David Rast indicated.

Columbia Properties, which also built the Wilshire Pavilion shopping center, had requested the rezoning.

The rezoning had been met with opposition from residents in the Wilshire Estates subdivision just across Ga. Highway 74. Opponents argued that the big box store would bring additional cut-through traffic on Holly Grove Road, the main entryway into the subdivision off Hwy. 74. Many kids walk along the road to and from the pool during the summer, as there currently is no cart path for them to use to make those trips, several parents had said.

Some opponents of the rezoning also complained that big box retail stores typically lead to an increase in crime, though no official studies to that end were cited.