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Driveway to Hudson Bar Too Steep, Owners Say

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By Carl  Orth | The Suncoast News

Published: November 17, 2007

HUDSON, Fla. - HUDSON, Fla. - The price of being a good neighbor to the Wal-Mart Supercenter next door was too steep for Bobkatz Bar and Grill owners.

The bar owners, Ed Beck and Pete White, didn't complain about business tapering off during construction of the Supercenter on U.S. 19 north of S.R. 52.

But they were astounded when Wal-Mart construction crews recently installed a driveway access into the Bobkatz parking lot with nearly a 40-degree slope.

"You couldn't get up it with a Hummer" four-wheel-drive vehicle, White complained, not to mention the potential flooding problems at the site.

"That's not what I call being a good neighbor," White commented about the Wal-Mart store.
Nearly certain the steep driveway violates county regulations, the bar owners contacted Commissioner Jack Mariano to enlist his help.

"That would be an expert slope if you were going to ski down it," Mariano said after inspecting the site.

Bipin Parikh, assistant county administrator for development services, and James Widman, director of engineering services, toured the site and concurred with his assessment, Mariano said.

Mariano arranged a meeting on Thursday between the bar owners, county officials and representatives of Wal-Mart and the Florida Department of Transportation to correct the problem.
The meeting, however, had to be postponed. David W. Walthall of Kimley-Horn and Associates, the engineering firm on the Wal-Mart construction project, said his staff would reschedule soon, according to county records.

Wal-Mart is working with the county, DOT and the property owner to find a solution that works for Bobkatz and for Wal-Mart, Quenta Vettel, Wal-Mart's senior manager of public affairs in Central Florida, said.

The bar has been at 12536 U.S. 19, under a series of owners, perhaps for more than 50 years, according to White. He and Beck have run the establishment for about eight years.

The main access to the bar has been directly off U.S. 19, but Wal-Mart needs that space for a right-turn lane into its main entrance. That would mean right turns from the right-turn lane into the mean right turns from the right-turn lane into the bar's parking lot, something traffic regulators might frown upon.

So the new driveway access into Bobkatz was created after drivers turned the corner and began proceeding straight along the Wal-Mart main boulevard.

Beck and White just never expected the short, steep driveway they now have, they say. Standing in their parking lot, the Bobkatz owners are practically at eye level with the top of the new driveway.

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