Plymouth residents will soon welcome the Shops at Plymouth Creek

Plymouth Magazine

By Ann Nolin

Come summer, Plymouth shoppers will have even more reasons to never want to leave the comforts of this growing community. After three years of planning and more than 200 different designs, the Shops at Plymouth Creek are well underway.

John Gelderman, director of retail development for CSM Corporation, the company behind the retail aspect of the development says, "Once I saw this project was for sale and the area around it was definitely perfect for retail, we decided to go for it."

Previously the home of Dana Spicer Building, this southwest corner of Hwy. 55 and Vicksburg Lane was zoned for industrial usage.

"We looked at doing everything from a grocery store there, and even took a look at a lifestyle center complex like up in Maple Grove was already moving forward," Gelderman says.

With this version of a retail complex and the perfect space to do it in, CSM finally looked to Lowes and Michaels as the key anchors of the project with places like M&I Bank, Walgreens, Salsarita's Fresh Cantina, Chin's Asia Fresh, Jamba Juice, SuperCuts and T-Mobile Cellular mixed in throughout.

In the end, $30 million worth of improvements were to be made on this 200,000 square foot retail plaza complete with a combination of meandering walks of brick and stonework complemented nicely with earth-tone stucco components.

In addition to the retail space, the Housing and Redevelopment Authority purchased five acres of land from CSM, upon which to put a four-story, 96 unit mixed-income senior housing development expected to be complete in the fall of 2006. "This project is something that continues to anchor the downtown retail area for Plymouth," Gelderman says. It is something Plymouth doesn't have, and also signifies things to come for [this community]."