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Home Depot scraps plans for new island store
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Home Depot has abandoned its plans to build a store on the site of an existing movie theater on Hilton Head Island.
A representative from an architecture firm working on the project called town planning staff Tuesday morning to say the company had decided not to pursue a store on the island. He cited "internal decisions" in the company, but it was not immediately clear what caused Home Depot to scrap the plans it had spent two years -- and presumably a significant amount of money -- developing.
The news potentially diffuses lingering controversy and mystery about the plans to build on the site of the Northridge Cinemas 10. Some residents were up in arms over the proposal that had another big box retailer replacing one of the town's two multiplexes. Plans called for a 69,000-square foot store -- smaller than the company's average 100,000-square foot store -- plus a 34,000-square foot garden center.
It's also a relief to the theater's staff, who said they were dumbstruck by the proposal because they had never been contacted by Home Depot.
"Our intent was never to sell to them anyway," theater manager John Snodgrass said. "Our intent was to be there."
The town found out Home Depot was ditching the plans through a voice mail left Tuesday morning by Hamilton Williams, an architect with Atlanta-based firm GreenbergFarrow, one of several companies that prepared extensive building layout plans, landscaping and parking lot configurations. The plans were so detailed designers haggled with the town over fence height, roof color and tree cover.
The voice mail cited decisions about "store protocol" but did not go into more detail, said planner Jayme Lopko.
Craig Fishel, a Home Depot spokesman in Atlanta, said the person in charge of the project was in surgery Tuesday and could not be reached for comment. The company has never confirmed it had plans for a store on the island, even as designs were submitted at Town Hall. Fishel said the company doesn't comment on its plans for future stores until real estate transactions have been finalized, he said.
Hunt Broyhill, vice president of PB Realty, the owners of Northridge Plaza, said he hadn't heard of Home Depot's change of plans until a reporter called him Tuesday. PB Realty is still locked in a legal dispute with the theater over a purchase option for the theater property, but the hearing is still pending and nothing has changed in the case recently, Broyhill and Snodgrass said.
Even at Town Hall, the Home Depot saga has raised eyebrows. The design of the building was approved in December, even though the company did not own the property. About a month ago, the company submitted a development application which was rejected because it didn't have the approval of the property owners, planning director Charles Cousins said.
"This has been an unusual one from start to finish," town manager Steve Riley said.
"Usually someone has control of the property to begin with."
Meanwhile, scores of residents who objected the construction of a Home Depot wrote letters to the editor and contacted Town Council members.
Residents said the store would contribute to traffic and overdevelopment concerns already troubling the island.
Rumors about the fate of the theater spread through last week. Snodgrass said some kids had conned their parents into letting them out of punishments to attend what was supposedly the theater's last weekend.
"We just kind of chuckle at all of it because nothing had changed in two years," he said. "It just fueled a rumor mill ... here on the island."
The adjacent Health Quest Fitness, which also would have been replaced by the Home Depot, felt the burn as well. Some customers declined to renew their membership out of fear the gym would close soon, owner Beth Watford said.
"It's not helping business at all," she said, "being in the paper and stuff."
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