Mount Kisco ShopRite Not Expected to Open Until 2024
News Based on facts, either observed and verified directly by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
Shoppers in Mount Kisco and neighboring communities who have been waiting for the new ShopRite supermarket to open at the Diamond Properties complex on North Bedford Road will likely have to wait longer.
Construction on the roughly 85,000-square-foot supermarket at 333 N. Bedford Rd. will apparently not begin until late winter or early spring 2023, said Mark Blandford, executive vice president at Diamond Properties.
“It’s just a complicated submission because it touches Mount Kisco, it touches Bedford, it touches the Department of Transportation because it’s on Bedford Road, it’s moving lot lines around,” Blandford said. “There’s DEP issues because of water usage and that sort of thing. It’s been a very complicated approval process. It feels like the stars are aligned now.”
Final site plan approval was granted by Mount Kisco in January 2021. Approvals were also obtained from Bedford.
The applicant recently submitted an amended site plan because of modifications. According to a July 19 letter from project engineer Stephen Spina, a current tenant at 309 N. Bedford Rd. has decided to remain in their space until the expiration of the lease. As a result, the existing building, which was slated for demolition, must now remain for the next several years.
Spina wrote in his letter that because of that, realignment with the southern driveway and Park Drive cannot be achieved as had been previously approved.
Diamond Properties recently acquired the adjacent Kohl’s property, Blandford said. That would provide a connection from an internal existing driveway in the property’s northern area to connect to the existing parking area within the Kohl’s property.
“The roadway will provide an internal connection that will allow passenger vehicles and delivery trucks to travel between the properties without having to enter onto North Bedford Road,” Spina stated. “The connection driveway between the site and Kohl’s is a traffic improvement that the Town of Bedford has requested in the past.”
Other modifications include a slight shift of part of the large retaining wall on the eastern side of the building so its height can be reduced.
The proposed wall’s new location has been pushed toward the building by about 11 feet, which helps reduce the wall by about 3 feet at the southern modified area and eight feet at the northern area, according to Spina’s letter. The wall modifications result in a loss of eight parking spaces. The adjustment also reduces the amount of proposed impervious area by about 2,000 square feet.
Another change is a remapped floodplain, which is no longer within the property boundary. Therefore, some of the soil that was to be removed from the site to help install the retaining wall will be used as fill in the northern parking area, reducing the amount of material needed to be removed from the property and saving trips by construction vehicles to and from the site.
Village Building Inspector Peter Miley said he is curious to learn where the applicant stands with the state Department of Transportation for the work that needs to occur on North Bedford Road. Discussion of the amended plan is scheduled to be discussed at Tuesday evening’s Mount Kisco Planning Board meeting. He conceded it is a difficult application.
“There’s no holdup on our end. They received approval from us,” Miley said. “It has to be outside agencies.”
Along with coordination with the Town of Bedford, nine zoning variances and a commitment for the southern and northern driveway realignments with Park Drive and Foxwood Circle, respectively, were needed. There were to be traffic signals installed at those intersections.
Martin has more than 30 years experience covering local news in Westchester and Putnam counties, including a frequent focus on zoning and planning issues. He has been editor-in-chief of The Examiner since its inception in 2007. Read more from Martin’s editor-author bio here. Read Martin’s archived work here: https://www.theexaminernews.com/author/martin-wilbur2007/
