Future ‘unclear’ for site of planned Whole Foods

By Rachana Dixit

Published: November 18, 2008

Work at the Hydraulic Road site of the highly anticipated Whole Foods has gone idle, putting the project’s status in question as the upscale grocer’s business suffers in the weak economy.

“It’s unclear,” said Chris Pine, a consultant for Red Light Management Co., of the Whole Foods’ future. The Charlottesville-based company, which owns rights to the Hydraulic Road parcel through a 99-year ground lease, is overseeing the grocery’s development.
Pine declined to elaborate. Nick Hahn, the project manager for the development team, did not return several calls for comment.
The project comes amid a struggling construction market, and recent days have seen conflicting reports about the future of the $30 million luxury Landmark Hotel, a nine-story, 100-room structure slated for the Downtown Mall.

Although there was visible activity at the Whole Foods site earlier this year — the Charlottesville Planning Commission OK’d preliminary plans for the 66,600-square-foot store and three-level parking garage in July — site work has ceased on the Whole Foods’ land adjacent to Kmart and Gold’s Gym. The project also involves construction of the first section of Hillsdale Drive Extended, a $30.5 million road that would connect Hydraulic to north of Greenbrier Drive through the Seminole Square shopping center.
Whole Foods Market Inc. recently experienced a precipitous decline in quarterly profit, underscoring the effect of the weak economy. The Austin-based company reported net income of $1.5 million, or 1 cent per share, for the quarter that ended Sept. 28, compared with a net income of $33.9 million, or 24 cents per share, in the period a year earlier.

Sales rose 13 percent to $1.8 billion, but the company said sales at stores open for at least one year rose 0.4 percent, one of its weakest performances since its founding in 1980.
Despite rampant rumors about the Hydraulic store’s status, several Whole Foods officials declined to comment on the project, which would replace the 27,000-square-foot grocery on U.S. 29 in Albemarle County. City officials said they have received no indication that the project is not advancing as planned, and developers previously said the store could open by the end of next year.
“We are continuing forward with their plan review,” said Nick Rogers, a city planner who has been working with Red Light. Aubrey V. Watts Jr., the city’s director of economic development, also said he believed the project was still under way and that he was not aware of any lack of financing.

But the local project already has encountered obstacles. Hillsdale Drive is likely to not be finished for years — the state has given Charlottesville $3.1 million for the design and engineering costs, but no more money is in the pipeline until fiscal 2014, when the city is slated to receive another $655,000.
And though planning commissioners long ago approved preliminary site plans, Jeanette Janiczek, Charlottesville’s VDOT program manager, said the city still does not have the right to build Hillsdale Drive Extended on the land because it has not been designated for public use. Developers would have to acquire the land after negotiations with the property owner, Charlottesville resident Michie Bright, before the city could begin to build the connector road and approve the project’s final site plans.

Bright, who along with her sister owns the 14 acres where the new Whole Foods and corresponding portion of Hillsdale Drive are slated to be built, said she has not heard anything in the last few months from developers.
“I don’t know what’s going on,” she said. Bright would not comment further on property negotiations.