Asheville’s Technical Review Committee met on Monday, Nov. 17, and one of the items on the agenda was regarding the potential for a first Costco in Western North Carolina.

An initial review of the proposed project, which is to be located at 264 & 274 Enka Heritage Parkway, was conducted during the meeting. 

Costco is, according to its website, "a membership warehouse club, dedicated to bringing our members the best possible prices on quality brand-name merchandise. With hundreds of locations worldwide, Costco provides a wide selection of merchandise, plus the convenience of specialty departments and exclusive member services, all designed to make your shopping experience a pleasurable one."

City of Asheville Urban Planner Clay Mitchell said the project is in the very early stages of the process for a Conditional Zoning.

The Conditional Zoning process allows a property owner to petition the legislative body (in this case - the Asheville City Council) to rewrite the zoning for a particular property or a set of properties, propose certain conditions and request certain modifications to a provision in the development ordinance that allows the project to take place if the Council finds the project, conditions, and modifications to be consistent with Asheville’s adopted Comprehensive Plans goals and objectives.

The proposed Costco would be a 160,940 square foot building with 839 parking spaces and the area of development would be 25.09 acres, according to the information presented at the meeting. There would also be a fuel center with 32 pumps.

The information presented also included notes from a community meeting that was held in August at the Enka-Chandler Public Library. At that meeting approximately two dozen neighbors attended and were given the opportunity to ask question, voice complaints or show support.

After Monday’s meeting, the next step is for the applicants to respond to the memo set forth by the Technical Review Committee before the project goes before the Planning and Zoning Commission. After that, the project would be taken to the Asheville City Council.