With the Ikea project now fully underway in Oak Creek, the 27 acres immediately south of the store along Drexel Avenue is being eyed for a mixed-use development.
Walden OC, LLC and Kevin Kennedy, the director of real estate investments for Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance, which owns 128 acres of land between I-94 and Ryan Road along Drexel Avenue, has asked the city to rezone eight properties immediately south of Ikea from single-family residential to an interstate regional retail district.
The properties are located at 1700, 1750, 1800, 1816, 1848, 1850 and 1900 W. Drexel Ave. and 7700 S. Ikea Way.
Most of the parcels were single family homes that are now vacant land. The only property that is still a single family home is 1900 W. Drexel Ave. The house is scheduled to be demolished in 2018, according to plans submitted to the city.
The plan commission will vote Tuesday on the rezoning request and on amending the city’s certified survey map to accommodate future development.
Northwestern Mutual has not submitted development plans for the site but is working on a future proposal that will “include regional retail and commercial uses consistent with developments in the vicinity.”
The regional retail and commercial district will be “consistent with the 50+ acres to the north,” and “is intended to provide for the orderly and attractive grouping of intensity retail, commercial and mixed uses along the federal intestate highway system,” according to plans submitted by Northwestern Mutual.
In November 2015, Northwestern Mutual asked the city to revise its long-term comprehensive plan so 60 of the 128 for a possible mixed-use development.
That development turned out to be the 291,000-square-foot Ikea store currently under construction. The store will open in spring 2018.
