Realtor refines retail plan

Proposal revealed for Clinton Parkway, Wakarusa intersection

Tim Schmidt is ready to pump $4 million into building a strip shopping center at a major intersection in southwest Lawrence.

Schmidt, a commercial Realtor for Coldwell Banker Commercial, is refining plans for Miracon Plaza on five acres at the northeast corner of Clinton Parkway and Wakarusa Drive.

The project includes space for a convenience store and a stand-alone restaurant, all fronting a building that would include retail and office space at a corner that’s sat vacant through previous attempts at development as the city continues to stretch westward.

“The site does present some real challenges, but there are some opportunities,” said Schmidt, acknowledging the site’s below-street-level profile and access limits from Clinton Parkway. “The people in west Lawrence need convenient goods and services.”

Schmidt plans to sell 1.5 acres of the site to an operator of a convenience store. Plans call for that store to cover 3,450 square feet, with room for four fuel pumps.

Miracon Plaza, proposed for the northeast corner of Clinton Parkway and Wakarusa Drive, would include two drive-throughs: a coffee shop/cafe or dry cleaners, at left, and a bank branch, at right. The Miracon name comes from developer Tim Schmidt's two children, Miranda and Connor.

The retail space would provide 8,000 square feet, with a bank and three drive-through lanes (one for an ATM) at the southern end. Another shop with a drive-through lane – either a coffee shop/cafe or a dry cleaners – would occupy the northern end, Schmidt said.

Offices would occupy the lower level, facing east and away from Wakarusa. There would be 8,000 square feet available for insurance agents, chiropractors or others interested in being at the busy intersection, he said.

Schmidt, who founded and later sold Schmidt Builders Supply in North Lawrence, bought the five-acre property in 2004 and initially hoped to put in a larger center, but his application for rezoning the property was rejected earlier this year by Lawrence city commissioners. Now he’s back with a scaled-down plan that he says conforms with the property’s existing zoning and fits within the community’s comprehensive plan, Horizon 2020.

The center would have a single access point, off Wakarusa and across from an existing car wash across the street.

He’ll take a preliminary development plan to the Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission on July 26 and hopes to secure the proper approvals to start construction by the end of the year.