More commercial space is coming to a much-watched corner in southern Overland Park that’s seen a lot of recent development activity.
On Monday, the Overland Park Planning Commission voted 9-0 to approve a final development plan tied to the commercial development at the southeast corner of 135th Street and Antioch Road.
The item was part of the consent agenda, so it was not individually discussed before the planning commission voted on it.
Commissioners Holly Streeter-Schaefer and Matt Masilionis were absent from the meeting.
16,500 square feet of commercial space planned
The final development plan shows two commercial buildings spanning 16,540 square feet between the pair of them in the Village of Overland Pointe retail area. The site is home to Bikanervala Indian Restaurant, Stroud’s and the B&B Theatres Overland Park 16.
That will make space for up to eight tenant spaces (five in an approximately 11,600-square-foot building and three in a roughly 5,000-square-foot building). To the east of the smaller building, there will be a patio space.
Previously, the city approved a drive-thru restaurant south of these two buildings, but the final development plan eliminates it.
135th, Antioch has been a development hot spot as of late
Across the street from the Village of Overland Pointe retail area, there once was a family-run tree and garden shop called Mission Gardens Nursery, and the whole area was mostly otherwise used for agriculture.
But in the past several years, development activity has heated up around where two major thoroughfares in Overland Park — that is, 135th and Antioch — converge.
OsLo Living, a 400-unit apartment complex, recently started leasing out after more than a year of construction. Next to that project, Overland Park earlier this year signed off on a new retail project at the same corner, made up of an assortment of drive-thru restaurants and other uses.
That kind of development has been met, at times, with skepticism from some neighbors, who have worried about the density of these projects and the traffic they generate. Additionally, city leaders, who worry they’re not getting what they were promised in some of these auto-centric drive-thrus, have pushed back at times, too.
Still, Mayor Curt Skoog, at the groundbreaking for the OsLo Living apartments in late 2023, said the city is starting to see its long-envisioned commercial hub at this corner come to life. He called it a “premier Overland Park story.”
“People saw the land as a way to earn a living, to start a business, to raise a family,” he said. “They understood that the future of this metropolitan area and Overland Park was going to be dynamic, and they wanted to be a part of it.”
Keep reading: Overland Park OKs new retail project on 135th Street centered around drive-thru restaurants
