By CRAIG FREILICH POTSDAM -- A convenience store developer is optimistic that a new Mountain Mart, with Kentucky Fried Chicken and Dunkin’ Donuts franchises, could be open before the end of the …
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By CRAIG FREILICH
POTSDAM -- A convenience store developer is optimistic that a new Mountain Mart, with Kentucky Fried Chicken and Dunkin’ Donuts franchises, could be open before the end of the year.
“I have a contractor who is ready to get out there the day I get a building permit, and with a 90-day turnaround, I hope we can be open Nov. 1,” said Bruce Monette, Jr., president of Adirondack Energy in Malone and developer and operator of Mountain Mart convenience stores.
The new Potsdam store would be at 119 Maple St., across from the Clarkson University campus and next to Eben’s Hearth Restaurant.
This Mountain Mart will include convenience items and fuel sales.
There are other Mountain Mart stores in Canton and Massena in St. Lawrence County and others in Franklin and Clinton counties.
Some of the steps that will have to be taken before the store can be built and opened are done and some are within reach, Monette said.
A curb cut onto Maple Street, U.S. Rt. 11, required state Department of Transportation approval while other actions had to wait until it was granted.
With a tentative okay from the Watertown DOT office, Monette has taken the proposal to the St. Lawrence County Planning Board, which met June 14 and made several recommendations that will be sent to the Potsdam Planning Board for their consideration.
They will consider aspects of the plan including parking, driveways, lighting and signs, and a special use permit for gasoline pumps, including the county planners’ recommendations.
That and other approvals need to be in hand before Monette will actually purchase the land from Clarkson. Then he will apply for a building permit and get the contractor started.
Clarkson has already been helpful by negotiating a lifting of a deed restriction from the early 1900s that would not allow gasoline business on the land, Monette said.
The lot was rezoned from educational use to B-1 business zone by the village board last year.
In addition to the convenience stores and the energy business, the Monettes also own and run Titus Mountain ski area, which they purchased six years ago.