Costco must prove that Wheaton needs a mega gas station at Wheaton Plaza to get Montgomery County to give it the special zoning exception required for construction. To try to bolster its case, Costco paid an Annapolis firm for a Need Study. I attached a copy here.
Costco's sales potential is the sole criteria the study uses to gauge Wheaton's need for a mega station. Montgomery County requires Costco to prove a need in the general Wheaton neighborhood, but the study uses the 15 square miles surrounding Wheaton Plaza as the principal market area (p. 2-1).
I wish I could tell you that there's more to Costco's Need Study than that, but it contains no deeper thought about the future of Wheaton. Costco's sales opportunity morphs into Wheaton's needs and that's it according to Costco. The study never considers the trade-off between more sales for Costco and Wheaton's loss of a metro accessible parcel that sits astride an important pedestrian pathway connecting neighborhoods, the Mall, and downtown Wheaton.
The study is illuminating for a moment (page 4-2, Exhibit 4-1) when it admits that Costco's corporate technique of measuring what Wheaton needs finds several types of retail that Wheaton needs more than a mega gas station. My favorite is Foodservice and Drinking Places, the study finds an 8 percent larger need for those establishments than for the mega station. More places like the Royal Mile Pub? Exhibit 4-1 masks the findings a bit, if you want we can discuss them more in comments.
Costco says (p. 4-5) that Wheaton needs to be a fuel depot for traffic from "most of Montgomery County, parts of adjacent counties and the District of Columbia." I don't believe Montgomery County will let that happen and I hope in the future we can discuss here in Patch ways the Wheaton community can present its vision of Wheaton's needs to our County decision makers.
Um from my read of this study they use the area within 7 min drive time of the proposed station location for the gas study but indicate that the Westown Maill and Cosco store retail market area will be larger -- ie 15 miles from the location. I understand that you are not happy about the prospect of a Costco gas station in Wheaton and so are looking for ways to discount this study. It shows the need for an additional gas station, as required by the County. Of course it does this from market potential approach --- what other need would there be? It does not assess the potential impact of this station on traffic etc in the Wheaton area ... is it required to by the county? Also I agree with the shortage of Foodservice and Drinking Places in the 7 min drive area... There may be a large concentration restaurants and bars in Wheaton Center but drive a few mins north and that situation changes quickly. Trying finding a Brunch place around Glenmont!
Surely you would concede that other factors must constitute need, like actual fuel availability! We have 34 existing gas stations in the 7 min drive you mention, and 14 stations within 1 mile radius of the proposed Costco site, including several discount stations selling gas at some of the lowest prices around. We do not need the largest gas station in the County next to a metro, 125 ft away from single-family residences, adjacent to an outdoor fitness club and a school for medically fragile children with special needs, including oxygen tanks!
The county has asked Cosco to show a need. Has the county defined need as something other than market opportunity? If not then the report addressed the county's requirements. The point that I was trying to make is maybe folks need to find another rationale. So question back to you, why don't we need this gas station?
For Montgomery County to allow Costco to build its mega station at Wheaton Plaza, Costco must prove that there is a need "in the general neighborhood, considering the present availability of identical or similar uses to that neighborhood." Take a drive around Wheaton and you'll find no dearth of gas stations. Costco attempts to evade the problem by proposing very expansive boundaries for the general Wheaton neighborhood. You're confused a bit about how Costco is attempting to define Wheaton, so let's go over Costco's definition: * Costco says unambiguously on p. 2-1 that it's "an area of approximately 15 square miles" emanating from Wheaton Plaza. * Costco says the general Wheaton neighborhood encompasses North Silver Spring, including the Fillmore and AFI, two institutions I wish were in Wheaton, they are the type of development that we really need. Costco goes on to include Four Corners, Glenmont, and Kensington in the general Wheaton Neighborhood. * You correctly noted that Costco claims (dubiously) that everywhere within the 15 square mile "general neighborhood" will be within a seven minute drive of the mega station. Given the number of lights involved I think it'll take you more than seven minutes just to get onto northbound Georgia Avenue after you leave that corner of the Mall. No need to try to discount this study, it discounted itself.
Costco is an innovative retailer and assuredly has staff with the business acumen to tailor a business plan to conditions in Wheaton. We are not a community on the side of a freeway but a community with a Red Line metro stop at its core, just eight stops away from Capitol Hill. The Wheaton community's vision of Wheaton's needs should trump any one dimensional study produced by Costco's hired guns and I believe Montgomery County will make that happen.