Amid a crowd of onlookers waving yellow "No to Fort Kroger" signs, the Urban County Council voted to approve Kroger's request for a zone change at the grocery store chain's property on Euclid Avenue.
Kroger was seeking to have its properties on Euclid Avenue rezoned from B-1 to B-6P, a shopping center designation. The B-6P zone was needed for Kroger to construct a new 86,000 square foot store. In May, the Planning Commission voted unanimously to recommend the zone change.
Dozens of neighbors voiced their opposition to the proposal, citing a number of concerns, such as the scope of the project being a insensitive to the neighborhood's character, traffic and access. Kroger representatives also gave a presentation in the public hearing which lasted over six hours.
All council members present voted for the project; councilmembers Kevin Stinnett, George Myers, Ed Lane and Shevawn Akers were absent.
Earlier in the year Kroger announced plans to raze the current grocery store on Euclid Avenue and construct a new outlet over double in size as the current store.
The day before the council public hearing, Kroger representatives announced that they were downsizing their plans for the Euclid Avenue grocery store, which included decreasing the square footage of the entire store by over 10,000 square feet, to 86,472 square feet. However, most of the decrease in space would be taken from the basement area; the ground-floor level would only be lowered by 1,100 square feet, to just over 64,000 square feet.
The current store is just over 38,000 square feet. Kroger wants to build a larger, modern grocery store with many more offerings representatives say customers are traveling elsewhere to purchase. Design plans for the new Kroger has 128 parking spaces on the roof (198 on the entire site), a drive-thru pharmacy and is oriented to face Ashland Avenue with its exterior walls up against Euclid and Marquis avenues.