BIDDEFORD — A project slated to begin later this year will bring a coffee shop with a drive-through, a sandwich shop and retail businesses, including two “big-box” stores, to 580 Alfred St., across from the Biddeford Crossing shopping center.

United Growth, a California-based development services and investment company, purchased the property from Old Dogs of Biddeford, LLC last summer, according to city documents. A plan to develop the site several years ago never moved forward.

The development will include approximately 20,000 square feet of business space and 97 parking spaces, project officials explained at last Wednesday’s Planning Board meeting. Vehicles will enter and exit the complex at the signaled intersection marking the entrance to Biddeford Crossing.

Additionally, the development’s parking lot will be connected to existing adjacent properties, such as Ray’s Small Engine Repair at 584 Alfred St., as well as future ones.

“It’s like connecting the parking lots, or the different developments, to allow people to move to and from and between them without having to go back out to Route 111,” said City Planner Greg Tansley.

Shawn Frank, an engineer with Sebago Technics, said the project is still in its early stages. For example, developers are still waiting on the approval of a traffic movement permit from the Maine Department of Transportation and a storm water permit from the state’s Department of Environmental Protection, he said.

Nevertheless, Planning Board members raised some concerns over the current site plan.

One member, for example, asked if a backlog of vehicles at the coffee shop’s drive-through would snarl traffic in the rest of the development. Frank said although that scenario is being examined, he feels the businesses’ hours will harmonize accordingly to prevent such a mishap.

“Everyone else is going to be closed when the coffee shop’s open (and seeing its highest influx of customers) at 7 in the morning,” he said. “You’re going to have a sandwich shop that’s not open for breakfast. You’re going to have retail that’s not open until 9 o’clock.”

Tansley also said the city is by rule not very concerned with traffic problems that could arise within the development.

“We’re really primarily concerned with … the public in the public way, not so much in the site,” he said. “If people back up on the site, I guess that’s the developer’s problem.”

Another concern raised by Planning Board members last week involved the positioning of the development’s buildings. Currently, the site plan lays the buildings as close to Alfred Street as possible, with the parking lot situated behind them.

The board seems entirely supportive of that design. However, Tansley said there’s one caveat to it: A city ordinance currently prohibits dual signage on the exterior of a building, unless that building is visible from more than one major road.

In other words, the current layout coupled with the ordinance would prevent signage visible to both those traveling along Alfred Street and those in the development’s parking lot.

When asked to consider putting the parking lot in front of the buildings, the developers said they would prefer to keep it as is. A small pond will already set the development back a few dozen feet.

“As we go farther back, we would just be hidden,” said Zeden Jones, an architect with United Growth.

Tansley admitted the ordinance is somewhat archaic, and he will contact the Codes Department to see if it can be changed.

The businesses expected to move into the property have not yet been identified. Jones said two of the six tenants are “big boxes leasing bigger spaces” but provided no further details.

Last month Daniel Stevenson, the city’s economic and community development director, said it is a common practice for developers to keep details like that under wraps until a project’s later stages.

“They don’t always go public with their anchor tenants,” he said.

— Staff Writer Angelo J. Verzoni can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 329 or averzoni@journaltribune.com.