WASHTENAW COUNTY, MI - A former Walmart Supercenter outside Ypsilanti that has sat vacant for more than three years could be set to turn a new page.
A California-based real estate developer and investor is purchasing the Roundtree Place Shopping Center in Ypsilanti Township, including the Walmart building, and plans to transform the former big-box store into a self-storage facility with some added retail space, according to township documents.
Developer DealPoint Merrill, headquartered in Los Angeles, intends to complete a multi-phase redevelopment of the commercial center, at 2515 Ellsworth Road. The project also includes making repairs to the parking lot, adding landscaping and eventually developing a new retail building in front of the former Walmart building, the township planning commission’s Tuesday, Dec. 12 meeting packet shows.
Consideration of preliminary plans and a zoning permit for the project were set to go before the commission Tuesday, but they were postponed until January at the developers’ request, officials said during the Tuesday meeting.
“The township has been in lengthy discussions with the applicant about the future plan of the site. The township and DealPoint Merrill have been cooperatively working together to repurpose the site to avoid a similar dilapidation such as Gault Village,” reads a planning review of the project, referencing the recently demolished shopping center near Ford Lake and I-94.
DealPoint will purchase the entire 30-acre Roundtree Place center, which includes the Walmart, the strip mall with Harbor Freight Tools and the strip mall with LL Flooring, but not the Taco Bell, Popeyes or commercial strip with Cricket Wireless, according to the planning documents.
The Roundtree Place Shopping Center, 2515 Ellsworth Road in Ypsilanti Township, on Tuesday, Dec. 12, 2023. Lucas Smolcic Larson | MLive.comLucas Smolcic Larson | MLive.com
On its website, the developer says it owns and operates redevelopment assets, including projects across the country converting big-box stores into self-storage “super centers” to anchor retail shopping areas.
In the Ypsilanti Township plaza, it proposes to repurpose the Walmart building into 131,600 square feet of self-storage, with an added 18,400 square feet of retail space.
The redevelopment also includes facade improvements, parking lot repairs, repaving, landscaping, the installation of license plate readers, lighting upgrades and removal of 27,400 square feet of the parking area, the documents show.
Preliminary plans show a section of the parking lot will be replaced with a landscaped area with a walking path and trees, as well as a pedestrian area with benches.
A subsequent phase of the redevelopment will include facade updates to the remaining portions of the shopping center, and a new retail building in the existing Walmart parking lot, but those steps are not included in the project currently up for review, according to the documents.
A view inside the vacant former Walmart Supercenter in the Roundtree Place Shopping Center, 2515 Ellsworth Road in Ypsilanti Township, on Tuesday, Dec. 12, 2023. Lucas Smolcic Larson | MLive.comLucas Smolcic Larson | MLive.com
The township’s planning department recommends the project be approved, the documents state. Township planning officials didn’t immediately return a phone call on Wednesday, Dec. 13.
The parking lot of the shopping center played host to a COVID-19 testing site in 2022, an operation established without proper permits that faced a shutdown order from the township. After granting a temporary six-month permit, township officials declined to extend the permissions for the drive-thru site, and it closed.
The Walmart Supercenter at the plaza shut down in 2020, around the beginning of the COVID pandemic.
The earliest regular Ypsilanti Township Planning Commission meeting that could include consideration of the redevelopment plans is scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 9.
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