Whole Foods Market announced Thursday that it would not build its new location in downtown Eugene, despite months of planning and support from the city and local property owners. The company is still considering another location in town.
Whole Foods, a natural and organic food store, worked with Portland-based Gerding Edlen Development Company, the property management group G Group, and city planners to build on a downtown block bounded by High and Mill streets and East Eighth Avenue and Broadway.
The rising costs of steel and concrete construction materials delayed the site’s groundbreaking and led to a 30 percent increase in construction cost and an increase in the site’s rent. That contributed to the company’s decision not to build, said Jenny Ulum, a spokeswoman for G Group.
Representatives for Whole Foods and Gerding Edlen could not be reached for comment Sunday.
Whole Foods planned to build a 52,000-square-foot building on the site that would have employed 250 people, according to document plans.
Parking was a major part of the project, as Whole Foods would have built a 240-space parking structure on top of the building. The city would have built an adjacent $8 million parking structure next to it, providing 260 spaces and 5,000 square feet of retail space. Although the project was met with some resistance by local business owners and community members, the Eugene City Council approved the plan in a 5-2 decision in March 2006.
City Councilor Alan Zelenka, who represents the neighborhoods around the University, said the downtown site was small and required a high-density building, meaning that Whole Foods would have to build up and spend more money on steel and concrete. As a result of Whole Foods’ decision, the city scrapped plans to build a parking lot, he said.
Zelenka said Whole Foods still expressed an interest to build in Eugene. He said he had heard three or four other sites mentioned, including the Crescent Village and Gateway areas in north Eugene.
“What (Whole Foods) will probably do is look for a different place where they don’t have to build that kind of structure,” Zelenka said.
If Whole Foods had waited another year to build on the site, it probably wouldn’t have been able to afford the site, he said.
The site is now vacant, except for an International House of Pancakes restaurant, which extended its lease through the end of October. Students approached for this story were either unaware of the proposed development or declined to comment.
Ulum said that Whole Foods’ decision not to build on the site frees up the property owners to look at other uses for the site, although “nothing was on the pipeline” since they had spent so much time on the project.
“I wouldn’t rule it out that Whole Foods could revisit (the site),” Ulum said.
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Whole Foods Eugene plans fall through
Daily Emerald
January 21, 2007
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