Bigger plans for Cooper Creek plazas

In keeping with the theme of area growth, Benderson Development is making a request of Manatee County for its commercial center off Cooper Creek Boulevard, to the north of University Parkway.

More.

Benderson wants more for commercial and office space, residential units and hotel rooms in anticipation of market demand. The requests are not yet on the county’s agenda.

“We’re adding some retail and office, possibly, to the plan,” said Todd Mathes, Benderson’s director of development. “We’re making room for future tenant build-outs. It’s an exercise in planning. We have no specific plans.”

Benderson’s application requests an additional 135,000 square feet of commercial space (951,200 total) added to the plan with much being attached to already planned buildings. Also included would be an extra 200,000 square feet of office or school use (378,700 total); 150 additional hotel rooms (400 total); and 250 additional residential units (1,017 total).

The request adds eight months to the allowed buildout, extending it to Aug. 30, 2020, as allowed by law because of Tropical Storm Erika in August 2015.

Mathes said most of the additional square footage would be used for tenants needs, allowing Benderson to attract larger retailers, such as Home Goods, which required an expansion of the former Shapes unit in The Shoppes at University Town Center.

The proposal only includes a few new buildings, including a 10,000 square foot building in front of LA Fitness. Another building is planned between Nordstrom Rack and the Hampton Inn & Suites, where a furniture store was once planned.

Benderson Development uses about 18,000 square feet of space behind Home Depot for some of its holiday light displays, as well as document and other storage. The company has considered an expansion of its headquarters, farther north along Cooper Creek Boulevard, that would essentially double its existing footprint to about 75,000 square feet (compare to 35,000).

“A lot of it is infill and redevelopment opportunities for the center and the one hotel,” Mathes said.

If Benderson adds office space, it likely will go on a triangular undeveloped parcel along Interstate 75, north of Cooper Creek Office Park.

Existing entitlements are in place for 79 residential units that have yet to be developed. 

A spot immediately south of the existing Savannah Preserve apartment complex long has been planned for future residential, Mathes said. Entitlements for another 250 units are being requested.

Christopher Hatton, of Kimley Horn & Associates, the company handling transportation studies for the project,  said traffic impacts from the proposed changes have already been accounted for in the previous analysis.

“We were conservative when we did the original analysis,” he said. 

At the center of the project is preserved land.

“It will stay that way,” Mathes said.