Kroger
has announced plans to not just renovate the Euclid Ave store, but to
replace it with a larger, ”urban lifestyle market”. That was the
phrase that Danny Lethco, a real estate manager for Kroger, used
repeatedly during a gathering with neighborhood residents and
interested parties. Maybe we just need to look at just what is an
“urban market”
Though
not exactly super markets,
these smallish grocery stores strive to provide our cities with fresh
food, meat and cooking staples within reasonable walking distance.
Corner stores like these became passe after super stores like
Walmart, Winn-Dixie, Kroger and Meijer came to suburbia. However
there’s been a new push toward walkability and sustainable growth
within our cities and we again need accessible food in our urban
areas.
This
Euclid Ave. store has been called a "university store" and
dubbed the "disco" Kroger by Ace magazine since it serves a
large number of eclectic students in the overnight hours, but it also
serves as an oasis in the food desert of the less well off of the
40508 and 40502 zipcodes. Many of them are faced with carrying their
groceries on long public transit rides, buying a car or relying on
convenience stores to purchase their necessities. Will they be
better served by making this an urban store?
The
confined space of a site for an urban style store will demand the
right balance of urban design and will present some challenges. These
grocery stores have to use a fraction of the space that super stores
have, prioritize the goods they will provide and consider parking in
an area unable to accommodate a super-parking-lot. With
these challenges in mind, many other cities and entrepreneurs have
taken the risk and opened such grocery stores. It may be helpful to
examine how they did it.
First,
I looked at the basic history of the seemingly ever increasing size
of suburban grocery stores. After the sprawl explosion of the 1950s
and ‘60s, supermarket chains have focused primarily on the suburbs.
The business model involved rolling out the same store with parking
in front, again and again. When supermarkets did build in cities,
they plunked down the same suburban box whenever possible. This
approach works as long as new growth is taking place primarily in the
suburbs and the cities languish.
Kroger,
in its history, is not a stranger to the Chevy Chase area and many
will remember when it occupied the space where Shoppers Village
Liquor through Josie’s sets today. Well, they even pre-date that
if what some of the old-timers told me is true when I was growing up.
I have been told that the now gone Ben Franklin five and dime,
which stood approximately where the drive entry is to the Ashland
Plaza, was built as a Kroger before they moved around the corner.
Kroger
also shared the Aylesford/Ashland Park/Chevy Chase shoppers up until
the late “60s with the Parkes Bestway (High St where Great Clips is
now) and the Colonial Albers (on the Kroger current site) stores and
a Minit Mart (now Sew Fine). I almost forgot the small corner
grocery where Architectural Kitchens & Bath now occupies. Most
all of them had good walk-up traffic until pantry and refrigerator
sizes grew, working mothers and time schedules dictated a large
weekly shopping trip rather than daily checks of what was fresh.
How
others have succeeded
When
looking at how others have succeeded, I turned to the Urban Land
Institute and took information from their 2011 Fall Meeting's
session on “Developing
Walkable Urban Groceries in Mixed-Use Environments”.
Chevy
Chase is very definitely a walkable, mixed use area, therefore I
believe that their recommendations should apply. Chevy Chase is also
urban, not quite urban core but firmly, in the minds of most, a
downtown area and ripe for infill or redevelopment. Kroger is
choosing the redevelopment path.
Parking
is absolutely necessary.
Nearly all urban-format grocery stores need parking, even in transit
rich neighborhoods, and it must be separated from residential
parking. Often, grocers require five spaces per 1,000 square feet
(93 sq m) of store. In the substantially denser urban locations
where significant percentages of customers walk, sufficient parking
is still required, although the allotment can be as low as two or
three spaces per 1,000 square feet. With the credits allowed for
bike racks and the transit stop, I believe that Kroger should have
this covered.
Pedestrian
entrance.
With a split between customers arriving on foot or by car, a key for
the design of the store is to get one entrance to face the parking
lot and the other to be an attractive pedestrian entrance off the
street. A store’s pedestrian entrance is critical in an urban area.
It requires a welcoming access point from the sidewalk.. Grocers
don’t necessarily want too much exposure and light, as natural
sunlight and windows can negatively affect HVAC systems and
refrigerated goods. In this case, an artist will tell you that the
northern light is more pure light with lower UV effects. Here,
Kroger has shunned the sidewalk/street and the lower UV light by
catering to the auto traffic.
Not
listed by the ULI is the inclusion of a drive-thru pharmacy window
for an urban market. Walkable urban neighborhoods tend not to need
such amenities. Rite-aid, just a block or so away, has no need of
one nor does Wheeler's Pharmacy on Romany Road. Just a few years ago
the CVS proposal at the Main and Vine intersection went through a
long, torturous struggle because of a drive through window. That
project failed.
The
location of the proposed drive through on this plan presents some
really troublesome thoughts. Firstly, it is hidden at the very back
of the structure and under the similarly hidden auto ramp to the
rooftop parking. If that was not enough, the loading dock ramp is
arranged immediately adjacent to the pharmacy window or at least
close enough to present possible traffic hazards. Add to that the
traffic movements into or out of the Marquis access point and I see a
real possibility of a SNAFU or worse.
Kroger
seems to have made one concession to their standard floor plan in
that the deli will occupy a portion of the space usually reserved for
the produce section. Ostensibly this is to allow the pedestrian
entrance to the “relaxing patio” behind the transit stop feature.
Of course this transit feature may be omitted since they donated a
considerable sum to the “Bank stop” across the street.
On
the idea of this “patio” or sidewalk seating, it is unclear if
this area will be like the seating at the Beer Trappe, Bourbon n'
Toulouse or Charlie Brown's. These cited seating areas work well in
the mild weather, but are primarily used by smokers due to the city's
ban. Will this really be relaxing if it is all smokers? Will
pedestrians want to use this as an entry point to the store if it is
filled with smoke?
One
of the details pointed out in Jeff Speck's book Walkable
Cities is
that the frequency and proximity of a building's entries to the
sidewalk/street will raise the perception of an area as walkable. I
have not heard of anyone devising a rating system or creating an
algorithm to chart such perceptions but one cannot be far off.
Positioning a building up to the street/sidewalk, or even within 20
feet of it, gives a more cozy feeling to the pedestrian but omitting
any entry options of personally relating to it or its occupants turns
those feelings to dread.
Our
recent snowfall and the current Northeast storm brings up a seasonal
complaint of mine. Kroger is, by far, not the only scofflaw in the
clearing of the sidewalks which adjoin their property. While it is
their duty and responsibility, by being farther removed from the
sidewalk there are many who will give them a ”pass” but it really
is a liability issue. By moving the building closer to the street,
it would seem to make the duty imperative, but if it is the side or
back of the building, that duty evaporates from the minds of
management since there are no employee access points there. The
suburban stores will never expect their customers to be to the rear
of their facilities, but in this situation it is where they are
forcing them to be.
The
larger picture
Just
what is the larger picture? At least one of the audience members
started off with the big picture agenda questions. “When this
store is expanded, will Kroger close the Romany Road store?” Very
direct and to the point but also quickly shunted to the side as too
far down the road. So, is Kroger not thinking in a long term frame
of mind? I doubt that very much.
The
very positioning of the proposed building hints that they are looking
at the older office buildings along Ashland Ave and the rest of the
property on the block, though they stated that they “have no plan
to purchase more property” at this time. Granted the PNC bank is
unlikely to sell as they would lose their visual street presence
opposite the very active Chase bank facility, but with the rise of
online banking neither is doing the volume they once did.
Speaking
of the Romany road store, is it so under-performing that it need to
be combined with another store or eliminated altogether? This store
functions as a reliable “third place” in the lives of the
neighborhood residents as do the aforementioned Wheeler's and the
several restaurants in the area. They have been woven into the
social fabric of the families there for several generations. In my
mind, the Romany Road store is a better example of an urban grocery
than what is proposed on Euclid.
One
last point taken from the ULI report is that “Grocery
stores transform neighborhoods”.
I would take that as both the addition to and the removal from a
neighborhood. John Given, who helped develop a Ralph’s grocery
store in South Park in downtown Los Angeles, described urban grocery
stores as providing an essential element of street life for
neighborhoods. The neighborhood grocery store, an urban market or
not, it is more important to the everyday life of downtown than Rupp
Arena or Keeneland.
To
quote Seth Harry, an architect in Woodbine, Maryland, who has retail
expertise “As long as walkable urban places are built
from scratch or revitalized, more urban-format stores will follow”.
In his view, the design of the store is driven by the urban fabric.
Kroger may now realize that they had to rethink the placement of the
parking in an urban location but it will still takes an urbanist
architect to convince most operators to accept other design
refinements.
Furthermore, Kroger's goals here may be
diametrically opposed to both the purpose and function of urban
markets. They stated that they wanted people to “buy more” when
they shopped at the Euclid Kroger, but people who walk, bike, or use
transit to arrive are not going to “buy more.” They already buy
what they can carry. Kroger is using suburban thinking and trying to
place it in an urban environment. That formula will not work.
There is also some question as to
whether the very idea of acres of shopping in under one roof is even
viable anymore. Malls are failing, or redefining themselves and
Walmart type stores are shunned by the wealthier classes who would
rather make trips to several boutique-style stores than one giant
conglomerate comprised largely of products they don't want. Malls
and superstores were originally meant to replace the old-world style
village markets, suks and bazaars. For a while this worked, but
shoppers today are more sophisticated than ever. They are not
interested in fake village markets, they want real village markets –
an experience that is simply not going to happen in any superstore or
superstore mini-version. Quality, unique products are not usually to
be found in such places.
So,
an "urban" market? Is it to be or not be, that is the question.
