April 25, 2024
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Verizon joining Starbucks in new building by Joliet mall

Two of four tenants now identified for site. Starbucks now open.

By Bob Okon

Verizon will move into the new multi-tenant building at 3064 Plainfield Road where Starbucks recently opened. (Bob Okon)

A Verizon phone store will become a tenant along with the recently opened Starbucks in the new building that replaced the Pier 1 Imports store in Joliet.

The building at 3064 Plainfield Road has space for four tenants.

The Joliet Zoning Board of Appeals last week approved a variation to allow more signs for the future Verizon store than otherwise would be permitted by the city’s sign ordinance.

While the building is visible from Plainfield Road, the front entrances and parking lot are on the other side facing Colorado Drive.

Planning Director James Torri told the zoning board that staff intends to change the city sign ordinance to adapt to what has become a reoccurring issue for retailers and restaurants.

“That’s why you see so many variances like this,” Torri said. “People want signs on non-road facing fronts, and our ordinance does not allow that.”

The Verizon signs will be “relatively small,” he said.

Verizon, will occupy the east end of the building, while Starbucks has the west end, and will be allowed three wall signs and a panel on the building’s monument sign totaling just under 121 square feet of signage in all.

Similar sign variations have been granted to other new arrivals in the retail district outside the Louis Joliet Mall.

A new building, housing a Starbucks and future Verizon store, can be seen from the drive-thru lanes at a new Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers that opened in March. (Bob Okon)

The Starbucks building is located next door to the Raising Cane’s Chicken Fingers restaurant that opened in March. Chick-fil-A opened at 2705 Plainfield Road in January 2021.

Pier 1 Imports closed in 2020. The retailer has closed all storefront operations but continues to do business online.

The Pier 1 building was demolished last year and replaced by the existing structure. No tenants have been announced for the other two spaces in the building.