Thursday, August 31, 2006

Dick's Empty Building Revisited - Former Lear plant to create hundreds of jobs
Remember this gloomy shot from one of Dick's first commercials?



WALKER-- It's more than 700-thousand square feet on 42 acres. The massive facility along Walker's Alpine Avenue, once home to the Lear Automotive plant, is in line for a major facelift. The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality announced Wednesday, plans to loan the City of Walker one million dollars for cleanup and renovation. The city is contracting Blue Bridge Ventures and partners to do the work.

It already has one tenant...

The goal is to make the structure ready to house additional tenants to neighbor with the Amstore Company. Amstore produces retail store shelving and currently occupies 450 square feet of the old Lear Plant.

... and the cleanup will lead to hundreds of jobs as the rest of the building is sold off.

"This project will create between 500 and 1,000 industrial jobs," says DEQ Director Steven E. Chester during a tour of the Walker plant on Wednesday. "It's going to provide the kid of economic stimulus you are all hoping for in this area."

The new owner wants to divide the factory into smaller units and lease or sell the spaces to industrial companies.


It will revitalize the whole area, which really isn't in bad shape to begin with. Alpine Ave. to the north of the Lear plant is already packed with national name retailers and restaurants.

Once it's clean and occupied leaders believe the former Lear plant will anchor economic development all along Alpine Avenue.

They say it will be an economic stimulus on nearby under utilized land between Grand Rapids and Walker they call "Grand-Walk".

"If we can use this as a successful example of sustainable redevelopment then that is going to send a strong message to other people," says Rick Chapla of the Right Place, Inc.

"We'll make this site the anchor of economic revitalization and job creation in West Michigan," says Walker mayor Robert VerHeulen.

Moral of the story? Don't let doom-and-gloom Dick fool you.