Fort warehouse destroyed by fire to be rebuilt

By Chris Spangler

The Fort Atkinson Plan Commission on Tuesday approved a site plan for rebuilding a portion of an Oak Street warehouse that was heavily damaged by fire last year.

The Aug. 10, 2021, blaze destroyed the north section of D.B. Oak, located at 700 Oak St. on the city’s north side. The south portion, which served as an office and staging area for several small businesses, was saved. 

DB Oak Limited Partnership, which owns the 20-acre site, plans to build a new 67,856-square-foot building to replace the north portion lost in the fire. 

City engineer Andy Selle reported in a memo to the commission that the addition is proposed to be used for heated warehouse space for local manufacturing and construction businesses. Inside will be 10 individual warehouse spaces ranging in size from 5,080 square feet to 7,760 square feet.

Each unit will have its own exterior entry door and overhead garage door, with a central hallway connecting all units together and to the existing south building. In addition, plans call for a covered loading dock on the north side to serve all units via the hallway. 

Selle added that each unit is designed to connect internally to the adjacent unit so that multiple units could be used by the same business, if desired. 

The proposed exterior building materials include light tan metal wall panel siding, gray split-face stone foundation wrapping, white metal doors, and bronze trim along all corners, roof edges and doors. 

In order to move forward with ordering building materials for proposed construction in 2023, DB Oak needed approval of the site plan for the building footprint only.

“Because of some circumstances surrounding the acquisition of materials for this building and some wetlands that are on the site that are not able to be characterized during the winter time, the request was made to move forward with just the review of the building,” Selle said Tuesday.

“The second part of this site plan for our review will come likely after the first of the year, he continued. “That is when we will look at the ingress and egress for this particular location, the landscaping plan, and how we will manage the wetlands that are on site. Those have been delineated, but the DNR needs to weigh in on the quality of those wetlands and what options are available for us to get vehicles in and out.”

The city’s zoning ordinance requires review of the proposed development’s building configuration, site layout and access, parking, exterior building design, landscaping, grading and erosion, stormwater, exterior lighting, signage and operational plan. 

After the DNR’s determination of wetland quality and extent between Cramer Street and the proposed addition, DB Oak will submit the remainder of the site plan materials for Plan Commission review in early 2023. 

No building permits will be sought until after the remaining site plan review is complete, Selle said.

Commissioner Jill Kessenich asked whether there is a master plan to develop the railroad tracks, which cross the property in question, to extend the Glacial River Trail.

“There is a desire to do so by the city,” Selle said. “We have reached out to the railroad several times. The last was a year ago and they did not have any interest in vacating the existent railway at this time.”

However, the bike path is in the city’s comprehensive plan, Selle noted, adding that it would not impact the setback requirements for the DB Oak property.

Commissioner Eric Schultz asked what tenants the warehouse spaces are targeting.

“Our expected tenants are primarily small businesses, contractors, people who need a place to store their gear and stage their operations from before they go out to their job sites,” DB Oak owner Randy Knox, who was attending the meeting with Harman Bos of Bos Design Builders, said. “There seems to be a shortage of that kind of space available. By the same token, we are planning construction so that if somebody needed a larger space, we could connect two or more units to each other …

“There are very few demands for very large warehousing spaces; there is a lot of demand for smaller ones,” he added.

Knox explained that the existing south end of the building houses a few small contractors, but the largest amount of space is rented by Opportunities Inc. for storing product primarily for Nestle Purina in Jefferson. Also, the Blackhawk Group’s “server farm” is occupying 20,000-plus square feet of space.

Commissioner Davin Lescohier asked Knox when he anticipates the building will be ready for occupancy.

“We’ve got some processes to go through with the DNR because of the wetland delineation in the wooded area north of the buildings that has the potential to affect access, and we have to get those details worked out with the DNR,” Knox said. “And then we have to come back here for actual building permits. It’s anticipated to be a steel-construction building and steel is a little more expensive than it used to be. We expect at least a half-million-dollar downpayment just with the order, and delivery times can easily be four, five, six, seven, eight months, depending on the supplier,” Knox said.

He continued: “It’s been a year and five months since the fire. It’s been a long time waiting. We’re finally to this stage, and we finally have occupancy on the part of the building that wasn’t burned. But I can’t promise a given timeline. Obviously, it is in my best interest to get it to a revenue-generating point as soon as I can. This has been a long time without, and the expenses keep coming in whether you’ve got the revenue coming in or not.” 

City staff had recommended approval of the building site plan, subject to several conditions, among them those relating to the fire cleanup, wetlands analysis and public right-of-way. Commissioner Davin Lescohier made a motion to do so. This was seconded by Commissioner Loren Gray and unanimously approved.