I think it’s going to be a beautiful development when it’s complete. It has designated use, while still remaining a mixed-use development. It brings cohesion to the industrial park and business park by offering both uses,” – Ryan Joss, Owner and Operator of Superior Storage Group, LLC
Dexter could be on its way to getting its first self-storage facility within city limits.
That’s thanks to a development proposal from a Livonia-based firm calling for the construction of 338 storage units and three multi-tenant buildings offering flexible industrial space for small and midsized businesses in the Dexter Business and Research Park.
The plans and a zoning approval for the project, called Superior Spaces, have undergone months of review by the city’s planning commission, finally advancing after a vote on March 4. They’re soon set for consideration by Dexter’s elected leaders.
“I think it’s going to be a beautiful development when it’s complete,” said Ryan Joss, owner and operator of Superior Storage Group, LLC, the company behind the proposal, during a presentation to the planning commission before the vote.
Superior Storage Group has taken planning officials’ feedback to heart, he said, and modified the layout of the project, proposed for a nearly 7-acre property on Bishop Circle West, inside the city business park.
“It has designated use, while still remaining a mixed-use development. It brings cohesion to the industrial park and business park by offering both uses,” Joss said, referencing the self-storage and flex space.
Superior anticipates the storage units would be low-traffic, offering space for household goods and storage for small business but not allowing large items like boats or RVs, according to a presentation Joss delivered to the planning commission in October.
The industrial buildings, with a total of nine units, could offer office and warehouse space to local businesses, Joss added.
The project would be developed in two phases, he said, with the goal of completely building out the vacant site in a three-year timeframe.
The Dexter Planning Commission’s discussion of the project centered on measures included in the plans to buffer the self-storage units from the outside. Some of its members disagreed on elements of the layout and screening included with the Superior Spaces proposal, like a proposed three-foot berm along the self-storage area.
Planning Commissioner Kyle Marsh described the latest iteration of the plans, with some of the storage buildings placed along Bishop Circle as a “bait and switch” from previous versions of the project, where they were more sheltered behind the flex industrial buildings, he said.
“You’ve got companies in here that are trying to be globally competitive. They’ve got people flying in from Japan and everywhere else, and we’re going to have just these storage sheds right there as you drive into our industrial park,” Marsh said.
Others on the commission said they found the layout sufficient, and they didn’t support requiring developers to swivel the units away from the road.
“In my mind it doesn’t matter if you flip it one way or the other, it’s not going to be something spectacular to drive into. So as long as there’s some sort of other way we can make that look appealing as you drive in, I don’t think it has anything to do with the buildings in this project,” said City Council Member Wa-Louisa Hubbard, who also sits on the planning commission.
Commissioner James Carty questioned if the berm in front of the storage units was even necessary, as other properties in the park didn’t have that kind of screening, and he couldn’t justify the requirement using the city code.
He was initially the only one on the commission opposed to allowing self-storage in the park in the first place, he said, but if the project is going to proceed officials should accept the fact that it won’t have some “hip urban design.”
“We’re all going to still know there’s self-storage back there. I think it’s a pretty good looking self-storage as far as it goes,” Carty said.
The commission voted 5-1 recommend approval of the preliminary plans for Superior Spaces and a special land use that would allow the project. Marsh was the only no vote, with Carty, Hubbard and Commissioners Tom Covert, Karen Roberts and Thomas Phillips supporting the proposal.
Developers will still have to address comments included in city planning and engineering consultants’ review of the project, and it will next go before Dexter City Council for consideration.
That could happen as soon as during the council’s March 25 meeting, according to city documents.
