Village Kroger store to make improvements to parking lot

GROSSE POINTE CITY — Shoppers — especially those with SUVs and trucks — may be ready to rejoice. The parking spaces at the Village Kroger store are finally going to get wider.

Grosse Pointe City Planner John Jackson, of McKenna Associates, said the grocer plans to widen the spaces from the current 8 feet to 9 feet, 2 inches. They will also be adding cart corrals, he said.

“Those will be some big improvements,” Jackson said during a June 20 Grosse Pointe City Council meeting.

City officials said the narrow width of the parking spaces has long been one of the most common complaints they’ve heard from residents and visitors, many of whom have emerged from a shopping trip to find dents and nicks in their vehicle doors.

As concerns go, “It’s way up on the list,” City Councilman Christopher Walsh said. “That’s a significant improvement that I think everybody that utilizes that store will approve of.”

In addition, Jackson said Kroger will be building a high-quality, 8-foot-tall masonry wall to screen the trash compactor. There will be an adjacent, fenced-in pallet storage area as part of this project, he said.

“The storage area’s going to be cleaned up quite a bit,” Jackson said.

Officials believe the new trash area will be cleaner and less unsightly.

“It stinks back there,” Mayor Sheila Tomkowiak said. “It’s dirty. It’s ugly. … We need maintenance. We need upkeep.”

City Councilman John Stempfle, at his last meeting, agreed, saying, “The odor is just overwhelming back there.”

Officials are happy to see the store making changes that they believe will address some of their concerns.

“The improvements that are proposed are really good improvements for our community,” City Councilwoman Maureen Juip said.

Tomkowiak said she was delighted about Kroger’s plans for the parking lot.

“It’s needed in the worst way,” Tomkowiak said. “It’s going to be a vast improvement.”

The Grosse Pointe City Council voted unanimously June 20 in favor of a special use request and site plan for the parking lot changes, which will also include modifications to outdoor displays.

Tomkowiak said the parking lot improvements will include removal of existing parking meters. They’ll be replaced by pay stations, she said.

The City has phased out its use of the Park Mobile app in favor of the Passport Parking app, which doesn’t have a fee to add time to a parking session, Tomkowiak said. For more information, visit www.passportparking.com.

Shoppers and other Village visitors should be seeing these changes soon.

“We are thrilled to invest in a number of upgrades. ... Our goal is to have these all complete by the beginning of the fourth quarter this year,” said Rachel Hurst, corporate affairs manager for the Kroger Co. of Michigan, in an email.

Garrett Foley, construction manager for this project, said it would probably take about 60 days to finalize the agreement.

“That’s a significant improvement, and we should not discount it,” Walsh said of Kroger’s plans for the parking lot. “I look forward to a mutually beneficial relationship with Kroger.”