By CLINT SCHEMMER
Orange County builder John Marcantoni has put an offer on the table that he wants the county and Wal-Mart to consider.
He recently contacted both parties to invite Wal-Mart to locate on 75 acres along State Route 3 west of Lake of the Woods. Marcantoni owns the property with business partner Robert Dudley of Stafford County.
Marcantoni said yesterday that he had not received a reply from Orange County or Wal-Mart.
The tract, which has 1,300 feet of Route 3 frontage, is planned for mixed-use development and is served by public utilities. The agriculturally zoned property is at the corner of State Routes 3 and 708, next to the Somerset Farms and Wilderness Shores subdivisions.
Marcantoni said he believes his property offers a way for the Arkansas retailer to build a Supercenter and Orange to build up its tax base without fueling opposition from the National Park Service, historians and preservation groups, as Wal-Mart's proposed Wilderness Corner site has.
Marcantoni's tract, which has plenty of room for a "big box"-sized retail center, wouldn't threaten the Wilderness battlefield or stress the busy intersection of State Routes 3 and 20, he said in an interview.
Wal-Mart spokesman Keith Morris said last night that the Wilderness Corner site is the only one in the Route 3 corridor that meets all of the retailer's needs, particularly that the property is already zoned for commercial development. He noted that Marcantoni's property is zoned for agricultural use, and that Orange supervisors rejected an earlier rezoning request.
Marcantoni, who has lived in eastern Orange for nearly 10 years, said ruling out agriculturally zoned property is premature. A special-use permit, which Wal-Mart must obtain under the county's big-box ordinance to be allowed to build its Supercenter, requires an applicant to perform all of the studies required by a rezoning, he said.
"This is a viable alternative. They're essentially going through a rezoning process now, and they're not even through the Planning Commission," Marcantoni said yesterday, before the commission met again to consider Wal-mart's plan. "The Board of Supervisors will make the final decision, but Wal-Mart is going through the same steps as it would in a rezoning."
Marcantoni had a traffic analysis done for the large retail center his partnership proposed as part of Signature Station, which also included dozens of townhouses. The traffic study accommodated full build-out of Somerset Farm and Wilderness Shores, along with a proposed convention center, golf course and subdivision named River Point, he said.
The Board of Supervisors liked the retail center but voted 3-2 to deny the 2006 rezoning request because of its housing component. That was highly controversial at the time because of other projects in the development pipeline, Marcantoni said.
Clint Schemmer: 540/368-5029
Email: cschemmer@freelancestar.com