No plans have been submitted to the township yet, but work hasbeen steadily progressing on the 200-acre site. Paul Aragona,president of the self-named corporation, tells GlobeSt.com that thefirms have spent a few years getting the site ready. "Lagoons onthe property have been cleared, and roadways have been built toallow access from M-59 to 12 Mile Road," he says. The land had beenbasically vacant forest land, across from the fenced military basethat mostly serves reserve forces.

The plans are still not final yet, Aragona says, but he says hehopes to have something submitted in a few months. However, theconcept has been expanded to include a 100,000 convention center,he says. "With the Novi Convention Center on the southwest, thiswill be the northeast center for the Detroit area, it will takecare of everybody in Macomb County. And with the dollar matchingCanada's dollar now, maybe you'll see Canadians coming over (theBlue Water Bridge through Sarnia) to work and shop."

The development would become the furthest eastern retail projecton M-59, a major east-west corridor through the northern Detroitsuburbs that ends at Lake St. Clair about a mile from this site.Retail has expanded east along M-59 during the past five-10 years,with the explosion of big-box stores in Utica, and marchingsteadily east. The property is also a few miles south of TaubmanCenters' new, 640,000-sf Mall at Partridge Creek in ClintonTownship, MI.