A light agenda awaits the Buckeye Planning and Zoning Commission when it convenes Tuesday evening for its 6 p.m. regular meeting.
A comprehensive sign plan for the Five Below Distribution Center is one of the few items on the agenda for the meeting, set to be held at Buckeye City Hall, 530 E. Monroe Ave. The plan will allow the company to place a 30-foot-tall monument-type sign along Miller Road, near its intersection with Durango Street.
The Five Below Distribution Center has been constructed and is currently operating. Five Below is a chain of retail stores that sell gifts, basic art supplies, specialty books and other novelties, targeting tweens and early teens.
Headquartered in Philadelphia, the company recently expanded into Arizona and now has more than nine stores up and running. When the Buckeye Distribution Center was first announced in summer 2020, the plan was to bring about 300 jobs to the area.
The 1 million-square-foot center sits on a 70-acre property. It’s part of a larger effort to make Buckeye and other Southwest Valley suburbs of Phoenix home to supply-chain operators along Interstate 10 and near railways.
Expedite the Diehl LLC is the company asking for variances in the comprehensive plan, on behalf of Five Below.
The current city of Buckeye sign code allows for a 20-foot maximum monument sign height with 72 square feet of sign copy area. Five Below’s sign would be a 30% increases in height and, at 110 square feet, a 52% increase in sign-copy area.
The sign would be close to the main distribution center building, which changed the skyline of the area on its own.
“Planning staff has reviewed the subject proposal and have no concerns with the proposed sign design, sizes, and materials,” a staff report states. “Because this 30-foot single sign is accommodating a facility elevation that measures 47 feet by 550 feet, staff feels the proposed sign plan would be appropriately placed in this location and would no negative impacts to the area.”
Also on the agenda is public input.
Most Buckeye City Council, Planning Commission and some advisory boards have meetings broadcast live and available later on the city’s YouTube.com channel, called “Buckeye Arizona.”
Jason W. Brooks is a News editor for the Daily Independent and the Chandler Independent.
He covers the Chandler area for both yourvalley.net and the monthly print edition while writing for and assisting in the production of the Daily Independent.
Brooks is a well-traveled journalist who has documented life in small American communities in nearly all U.S. time zones.
Born in Washington, D.C. and raised there and in suburban Los Angeles, he has covered community news in California, New Mexico, Arkansas, Iowa, Nebraska and northern Arizona.
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