POSSIBLE DESIGN OPTION FOR COLONIAL PLAZA BY BCT DESIGN GROUP

We told you HERE in February 2022 in a previous Ask Bungalower” column that Kimco Realty Corporation had taken ownership of Colonial Plaza in the Milk District as part of a larger merger with Weingarten Realty Investors. In that post, we shared their early plans to convert some of the property into mixed-use apartment buildings rather than maintaining the single-use status quo.

Well, it seems as if they’re leaning even more into the vision of more housing on the property with updated plans to remove almost half of the current retail, rather than their original plan to focus on Barnes & Noble and PetCo.

According to our little birdies in City Hall, Kimco is in the very early stages of planning to remove all of the current retail facing Bumby Avenue; from Barnes & Noble to Old Navy, as well as the standalone building in the center of the property that houses a Starbucks and TooJay’s Deli, and the half of the far eastern building that houses Conn’s Home Plus and Marshall’s.

Kimco is looking to make the property more pedestrian friendly, decrease asphalt and add more greenery, and create some more public-friendly spaces for the neighborhood, and has hired BCT Design Group out of Baltimore to develop some possible design options for the plaza, including the one below. BCT has carried out a number of suburban mall developments over the year and you can see an example of the types of uses they’ll be pushing for the property by clicking HERE.

This project is in the very early stages of development and there is no public timeline to share at this time.

POSSIBLE SITE DESIGN RENDERING BY BCT DESIGN GROUP

Brendan O'Connor

Editor in Chief of Bungalower.com

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  1. I’m all for it. They own it, they can do whatever they want with it. Sprouts is an overpriced Publix and won’t be missed.

  2. Our area already has limited shopping and dining and colonial plaza should stay as it is.
    If a company is looking for an opportunity for redevelopment then drive down the road to the “Dead Fashion Square Mall” or a little further up the road on the right and there is an entire plaza that has more dead space than retail.

  3. If they could relocate Sprouts in the Hobby Lobby space, structure the Marshall’s and Ross like in Winter Park (remove Diamond Rug), swap Starbucks for Ulta, and put B&N where Bealls is, that would be more efficient use of that space.

  4. hmmm this will be interesting to watch. the bigger question is what if any progress is being made up the street at FSM?
    Thanks for all you do. I check Bungalower everyday.

  5. Really? Of all of the shopping centers near this area they focus on one actually doing business. That is insane and is stupid. These are good businesses that provide a lot of retail that we need. Look around at Fashion Square, retail near airport on Colonial, and others. They are not surviving due to poor management and now this is ruining what good is in that area. Just does not make sense when all these other places need work. Where will we go for retail and dining?

  6. I feel for all the retail spaces and their employees. IF any of them return i am sure they will pay a huge increase in rent. They have vacant spots now and there. The renovation for Sprouts must have cost a lot. I wonder if they knew this was going to happen before they signed their lease.

  7. I regularly shop in that area and am not for this at all. There’s a lot of activity in that retail space and they have no reason to take out so much of it. What they need to do is take this development down to the Fashion Square mall area where it’s in dire need of revitalization.