Custom Fit

Custom Fit

In what could be a sign of things to

come, RR Simmons Construction builds a unique urban hybrid store for Publix.

Randy Simmons is ready to help clients any way he can, but the Tampa contractor isn't used to doing a commercial construction project "on a postage stamp, parachuted into the crossroads of south Tampa."

He may have to get used to it.

Simmons and his company, RR Simmons Construction, recently finished the Publix GreenWise Market, an organic food store at West Azeele Street and Armenia Avenue in south Tampa's Hyde Park that opened earlier this month.

It was a challenging job for a couple reasons. One, it had not been done before. Two, there was a lack of space. Construction took place on a city block surrounded by apartments and other city buildings.

"It might be the wave of the future," Simmons says. "As retail is so expensive, and companies want to be at Main Street and Main Street, choices go fast. A big site might be an acre. I think this a bell cow. We're going to see a lot more of this."

With no lay-down area for equipment and parts, everything needed to be staged off a truck bed. Concrete building pieces were precast off-site in a plant and trucked in, rather than formed and cast on the construction site.

There was no room for a parking lot. So Simmons built elevated parking decks with 200 spaces in two levels above the store and put a speed ramp on the side of the building to get customers up there. It put its own trucks inside the shell of the building while working.

It also built a large elevator system, one big enough to handle people and shopping carts.

While challenging, the next urban GreenWise should go faster.

"There's a mystique to retail in residential neighborhoods," he says. "Once we got that one down, future ones should be easier. It's a little like 10 pounds of potatoes in a five-pound sack."

The project was one square block. "There wasn't much wiggle room," he says.

Simmons has been talking to Publix about unique urban solutions. Some included elevating the store and putting parking underneath it somewhat similar to Morin Development's Whole Foods store at Dale Mabry Highway and Interstate 275.

But Publix wanted to camouflage and imbed the parking more. So Simmons designed two floors of parking under a ramp with the store at ground level.

"We used every square inch," Simons says. "It was an extreme urban approach."

The design was also in keeping with the style and color of the Zom apartments next door. Simmons designed an escalator from the grocery floor to the second floor and two big freight elevators.

In less than a year, the project was done, on time. A spirit of teamwork between Simmons, Publix and the city helped. The crews had one complaint from neighbors, but it wasn't from the Publix work. The city accidentally cut a water main.

The new store replaced a series of older buildings. And it blended into the neighborhood.

"The neighbors are delighted," Simons says. "I can speak for our guys. We had a high degree of satisfaction, too. We've had more visible projects, but not many with more interest than this one."

Simmons designed the building and garage in three-dimensional CAD files, so it was easier for Publix and the city to visualize. It updated them frequently.

"To us, it was a large engineering experiment," Simmons says. "To them, it's the customer experience. For all of us, it was very engaging."

It may be a while before Publix repeats this feat. Its next two GreenWise stores, in Tallahassee and Winter Park, will be in old Albertson's locations.

- Dave Szymanski