City panel OKs McDonald’s changes

GARY BUDZAK

Staff Writer

The city of Delaware’s Plan­ning Com­mis­sion unan­i­mously approved requests for a sec­ond drive-through and exte­rior ren­o­va­tions to the McDonald’s at 2091 U.S. 23 North dur­ing its March 6 meeting.

Those changes include cut­ting the size of the golden arches sign in half while mov­ing it closer to the road for higher visibility.

“The dou­ble drive-through will be sim­i­lar to what we approved on the South San­dusky Street McDonald’s over a year ago,” said Lance Schultz, plan­ning and zon­ing administrator.

“I do like the plan,” said com­mis­sion mem­ber Maria Von­ada. “I like the access to the two lanes. I think it’ll be good. … I think it flows well.”

“This rep­re­sents a sig­nif­i­cant rein­vest­ment in our com­mu­nity,” said David Efland, plan­ning and com­mu­nity devel­op­ment direc­tor. “It really looks fan­tas­tic. I think it will be a wel­come addi­tion, espe­cially to the north­ern gate­way to our community.”

McDonald’s rep­re­sen­ta­tive David War­ren told the com­mis­sion the ren­o­va­tions are part of the restau­rant chain’s “incen­tive to have the oper­a­tors bring the build­ings into the 21st cen­tury.” War­ren said McDonald’s will pay half of the esti­mated $900,000 cost to make the changes. “With­out this pro­gram, the build­ing could sit for another 10 or 20 years” before being ren­o­vated, War­ren said.

“What we’re doing here is tremen­dous for the city of Delaware,” said Rod Boester, the owner-operator of the McDonald’s. “It is one of the first things you see com­ing down 23 as you come into Delaware.”

The build­ing was con­structed in 1985, with a 38-foot-tall main sign that’s obscured by other signs in the shop­ping cen­ter. “Right now, the way it looks, I’m embar­rassed,” Boester said.

The pro­posed new sign will be mounted on a lime­stone base. After dis­cus­sion, the com­mis­sion amended two of the 12 con­di­tions they requested from McDonald’s to allow for a com­pro­mise on the size of the sign. Both requests were approved by a 5–0 vote.

Access to U.S 23 will remain the same, Schultz said. The drive-through will result in a net loss of eight park­ing spaces. Other ren­o­va­tions include a larger trash bin, and the instal­la­tion of shrub­bery and trees.

Efland said the mat­ter will next be pre­sented before Delaware City Coun­cil, with a pub­lic hear­ing on March 25.

Posted by Staff Reports on Mar 8 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.