DATE: Wednesday, November 19, 1997          TAG: 9711190476

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY JON GLASS, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:   65 lines

HOME DEPOT GETS CLEARANCE TO LOCATE NORFOLK STORE

Home Depot, the nation's largest home improvement chain, plans to build a 130,000-square-foot store off Military Highway at the Broad Creek Crossing Shopping Center.

The City Council on Tuesday cleared the way for the development by voting unanimously to rezone a 35-acre tract that will allow the shopping center to expand about 1,100 feet northward along the highway.

In addition to the Home Depot, expected to create 200 jobs and generate an estimated $600,000 in tax revenue for the city, the expansion will include another major tenant, as yet unnamed, in a 50,000-square-foot building.

Three additional parcels that front the highway will be developed as well. The development will include 915 parking spaces.

The expansion, the second phase for the Broad Creek center, represents an investment of about $10 million, said Michael E. Glenn, development manager of Armada/Hoffler Holding Co., the project's builder.

``It's pretty significant,'' Glenn said. ``Home Depot brings in a new element to home improvement.''

Glenn said the Home Depot store should be open by August 1998.

The Atlanta-based company announced earlier this month that it planned to enter the Hampton Roads market with six new stores, including two in Chesapeake and one each in Norfolk, Virginia Beach, Hampton and Newport News. The strategy places the company in head-to-head competition with other building superstores in the region such as Lowe's, Hechinger/HQ and Builders Square.

The announcement that Home Depot is locating on the Military Highway corridor follows an announcement two weeks ago about a $19 million makeover at nearby Military Circle Mall, including a 127,000-square-foot full-service Sears, a $5-million facelift of the Hecht's anchor and a 20-screen multiplex theater.

City officials said the business growth in the corridor, one of the city's top job and tax generators, is significant, particularly since it is happening while the widening of Military Highway has caused major disruptions.

``What we're doing is anchoring both ends (of the highway),'' Richard J. Henn, manager of retail development for the city's Department of Development, said. ``We're bringing it back to the way it used to be.''

The Broad Creek Shopping Center opened less than a year ago and is home to a Target department store, a Food Lion supermarket and a Dairy Queen.

Officials said that the planned expansion would not adversely affect traffic and surrounding residential neighborhoods, including Lansdale and River Oaks just to the north. The tract that the city rezoned is now vacant, but had been used as a golf driving range. It is located just north of Lowery Road and on the west side of Military Highway.

To accommodate the expansion, the council voted to change the land's zoning from a single-family and commercial corridor to conditional commercial.

At a public hearing before the vote, Randy Lassiter, the president of the Lake Taylor Civic League, said residents supported the development but that they were concerned that the landscaping plans were inadequate.

``We need some aesthetics, we need some trees, we need some bushes,'' Lassiter said. ``These little one-inch saplings they're putting out there are not acceptable. We are being surrounded by these businesses, and we support them and the economic development. We just want them to do more than what they've seemed willing to do.''

Councilman W. Randy Wright added, ``One of the problems we've had with Military Highway is the lack of any real landscaping . . . to make people feel better about doing their shopping over there.''

City staffers said the developer's landscaping plans were adequate but would be monitored to ensure the finished product is satisfactory.

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