No plans have been submitted to the township yet, but work has been steadily progressing on the 200-acre site. Paul Aragona, president of the self-named corporation, tells GlobeSt.com that the firms have spent a few years getting the site ready. "Lagoons on the property have been cleared, and roadways have been built to allow access from M-59 to 12 Mile Road," he says. The land had been basically vacant forest land, across from the fenced military base that mostly serves reserve forces.
The plans are still not final yet, Aragona says, but he says he hopes to have something submitted in a few months. However, the concept has been expanded to include a 100,000 convention center, he says. "With the Novi Convention Center on the southwest, this will be the northeast center for the Detroit area, it will take care of everybody in Macomb County. And with the dollar matching Canada's dollar now, maybe you'll see Canadians coming over (the Blue Water Bridge through Sarnia) to work and shop."
The development would become the furthest eastern retail project on M-59, a major east-west corridor through the northern Detroit suburbs 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 marching steadily east. The property is also a few miles south of Taubman Centers' new, 640,000-sf Mall at Partridge Creek in Clinton Township, MI.
"Our site is basically Main and Main for Macomb County, at the intersection of both major highways," Aragona says. "The population base is definitely shifting over north and west from Detroit."
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