Whole Foods halts plans!!! (Pittsburgh, Fox Chapel: renters, chapel, neighborhood)

[wpipkins2]

OOPS!

Whole Foods halts plans to build bigger Pittsburgh store in East Liberty | TribLIVE

[fleetiebelle]

So, even after the low-income residents were kicked out, buildings were demolished, now there's just going to be a vacant lot?

[gg]

Well there goes a bunch of jobs that pay pretty well AND require very little training that the area so desperately needs. How sad. So Whole Foods will be stuck with that undersized store with a horrible parking lot. Yep, that sounds like Pittsburgh. We will do anything we can to stop growth of any kind and only cater to jobs that require high level degrees and lots of training! Geez, what a bunch of morons stopping this. Talk about the privileged stopping jobs for those in need, but that is our way around here!

[krogerDisco]

I think Whole Foods had been struggling as regular stores are responding to customers wanting "organic" and "up-scale" food.

[AaronPGH]

Whole Foods may be struggling as a company but the East End location of theirs is one of the highest performing in the company per square foot. They really want that new store. Everything going wrong here for Gumberg (LG) has been self-inflicted by how they've gone about the whole thing. My gut feeling is that WF probably tired of being connected to it once he started the lawsuits instead of trying to rework plans. They're now trying to use their weight to get him to play nice, which could work.

[armourereric]

Whole Foods had some very bad news and a major negative Wall Street analysis come out probably has everything on hold nationally.

[gg]

What is interesting is not only Whole Foods not expanding, but also Fresh Market that was going to move into Fox Chapel is looking grim. Seems the powerful Giant Eagle is spreading its wings? Ah well, at least Giant Eagle is a local company and if all other grocery stores can't expand at all, it will be good for Giant Eagle. Guess we should be happy about that.

On the bright side, someone mentioned Walmart was looking on expanding into that Whole Foods site and that would be a great situation for East Liberty and the entire East End. Go Walmart!

[xdv8]

The East End gets a new urban prairie, sweet.

[kewlwhip]

It's possible Whole Foods is trying to insulate themselves from bad PR associated with the entitled poor renters who have villainized the project. Or perhaps they hope to use the developer's messy situation to their advantage to negotiate a better deal.

[RS_1982]

I think the Whole Foods was smart to pull out of this project since it doesn't mesh well with its branding. My guess is that they will try to find another location in the East End where they can develop a larger store. The worst possible thing that could happen for that site is for an even larger, and far less worker friendly, big box retailer (like Walmart) to be developed there. I take pride in the fact that there are no Walmarts in the city of Pittsburgh.

It would have been possible for the the developer, LG Realty, to work with the city and adjust their redevelopment plans after the City Planning Commission rejected them in January but they instead decided to take their grievances to court. The community (i.e. the owners and renters who live in each neighborhood) should have the opportunity to influence a plan which a) displaced 200 people and b) affected neighborhood green space (Enright Parklet).